Talking About What You Do and Don’t Drink

In this lesson, you’ll learn how to say what you drink — and what you don’t drink — using the verb boire (to drink).

Basic Structures

Add adverbs to say how often:

French	English
Je bois du thé.	I drink tea.
Il boit du café.	He drinks coffee.
Elle boit de la limonade.	She drinks lemonade.
Ils boivent souvent de l’alcool.	They often drink alcohol.
Je bois parfois du jus de fruit.	I sometimes drink fruit juice.

To say never drink, use the structure:
ne + verb + jamais

French	English
Je ne bois jamais d’alcool.	I never drink alcohol.
Il ne boit jamais de café.	He never drinks coffee.
Elle ne boit jamais de thé.	She never drinks tea.
Ils ne boivent jamais de limonade.	They never drink lemonade.

Boire is an irregular verb, so it doesn’t follow regular -re or -ir patterns.

Notice that bois and boit sound the same, even though they’re spelled differently!

French uses partitive articles (du, de la, de l’) to mean “some” or “a bit of”:

These articles change to de / d’ in the negative:

So if you’re saying never or not, you drop the du / de la / de l’ and just use de or d’.

French negatives usually go around the verb:

Example:

Give the following in French:
I sometimes drink alcohol.

Give the following in French:
I never drink coffee.

Give the following in French:
He often drinks herbal tea.

Give the following in French:
They always drink mineral water.

Give the following in French:
They never drink cider.