Discover the French phrase "C'est n'importe quoi"

Ready to learn everything you want to know about the basic sentence "C'est n'importe quoi"? To be clear, it includes a detailed guide of what it is and how you can use it in a casual conversation with an audio example. Along with the useful things we added like synonyms, slow pronunciation audio, dialogue example and more!

French to English

Translation : That's bullsh*t
Register : Informal - Basic

How to pronounce?

Slow

Normal

IPA : / sɛ nɛ̃pɔʁtə kwa /

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C'est n'importe quoi meaning

Definition

It literally means:

C'est → It is
n'importe quoi → Bullshit / Nonsense / Whatever

The expression "C'est n'importe quoi" is commonly used in daily French. Depending on the context, it can mean "It's nonsense" or "Bullshit" as you will see just below.

How to use it

First scenario: someone says something completely untrue or unrealistic:

Mon poisson rouge sait conduire → My gold fish knows how to drive
C'est n'importe quoi ! → Bullshit!

Second scenario: you are talking about something shameful, shocking or nonsensical:

Cette société maltraite les animaux, c'est n'importe quoi ! → This company is mistreating animals, that's a nonsense/shame!

In most cases, you can shorten it by using "N'importe quoi" without "C'est". The meaning is the same, it just makes it more informal. Same thing for the slang version "C'est n'imp".

Synonyms

N'importe quoi. ("Bullshit / Nonsense")
C'est n'imp. ("It's bullshit / nonsense")(Slang)
Ça n'a aucun sens. ("It has no sense")
C'est du délire. ("It's crazy / delirium / nonsense")
C'est des conneries. ("It's bullshit")

Example in a dialogue

Dialogue

À mon avis, la terre est plate

In my opinion, earth is flat

C'est n'importe quoi !

That's bullsh*t!