Level B1 (Intermediate)
In French, there are two main ways to say “on the other hand”: par contre and en revanche. While both are widely accepted as synonyms, there is actually a subtle difference between the two, which we’ll explain below.
en revanche /ɑ̃ ʁə.vɑ̃ʃ/, par contre /paʁ kɔ̃tʁ/
En Revanche & Par Contre: Understanding Nuances
En revanche
Explained very clearly on the French site Sophieviguiercorrectrice.com, en revanche means ‘on the other hand’ in the context of providing ‘positive information, an asset, an advantage, compared to the information which precedes it’.
In this example sentence, en revanche could also translate to ‘yet’ and ‘however’.
Marie n’est pas douée en langues mais en revanche elle est très forte en maths.
Marie isn’t very good at languages. On the other hand, she’s good at math.
Here’s another example sentence which illustrates the explanation. For the English translation we’re simply using the word ‘but’ to mean ‘but on the other hand’. The pronoun y means “there”. This post on French Today provides an explanation of y.
C’est loin mais en revanche ça vaut la peine d’y aller.
It’s far but it’s worth going.
Par contre
Following the explanation on Sophieviguiercorrectrice.com, par contre means ‘on the other hand’ implying ‘the introduction of a disadvantage, of negative information’.
Nicolas est très fort en allemand. Par contre, il n’est pas très doué pour l’anglais.
Nicolas is very good at German. But, on the other hand he’s not very good at English.
Here’s one more example:
Gérald est très beau, par contre il n’est pas du tout intelligent.
Gerald is very handsome. However, he’s not intelligent at all.
Continue learning French – related words
- Cependant – yet, nevertheless
- Toutefois – however, nevertheless, nonetheless
- Tandis que – whereas, while
- Bien que – even though, although
- Tandis que – whereas, while
- Alors que – while, even though
- Malgré – despite, in spite of
- Effectivement – indeed
French Word of the Day | Lessons by David Issokson
