Five podcasts to help your French listening skills: films, news, Olympics

Listening can be one of the toughest areas to master when learning a language as it requires intense concentration for long periods, and can feel overwhelming when there are multiple people in the conversation.

To help familiarise yourself with your target language, specifically people speaking naturally as they would with other native speakers, listening to conversations at home is helpful as you can pause, slow down, and rewind to repeat certain sentences.

This can be done with films and TV shows but an increasingly popular option is via podcasts. 

These have the added benefit of allowing you to remain engaged in the content for longer, as you can listen to a podcast about a subject you have an interest in, such as news or music.

You can also listen to a podcast just about anywhere, provided you have your mobile phone (and a pair of headphones if in public), making it significantly easier to regularly listen to than a film or TV show

Below are five varied and useful podcasts you can listen to, some of which have hundreds of episodes uploaded already.

These can be found on various podcast apps and websites, such as Spotify, Apple, or Deezer.

Hugo Decrypte: Les Actus Pop

Hugo Decrypte is a very popular podcaster and a big presence on social media - he brings out daily news podcasts Monday to Friday focusing on the main headlines of the day.

However, he also has a number of other podcasts about current affairs, which may be more palatable for a quick and easy listening experience.

Les Actus Pop brings entertainment and culture news to your ears in short episodes of around 6-7 minutes.

A good idea when listening to these would be to also find a news article about the subject they discuss to help consolidate the new vocabulary and give you a wider understanding of the subject in question. 

2 Heures de Perdues 

For the film buffs among you, 2 Heures de Perdues is a great option.

Each of the five hosts pick apart and analyse different movies, ranging from cult classics to major blockbusters. 

If you are already familiar with the films being discussed, it should help you in understanding the podcast, as the context will already be established in your mind. This can help you focus on the French being spoken by the hosts.

You could also use it as an opportunity to rewatch some of your favourite films in French as a refresher before listening to the pod episode.

Read more: Five films and series to improve your French in August

L’histoire des Jeux Olympiques: l’étonnant miroir de notre histoire 

If Olympic fever has got to you, this mini series will help to fuel your cravings. 

L’histoire des Jeux Olympiques: l’étonnant miroir de notre histoire features episodes that are around six minutes long, looking at past Olympic Games, from the first modern event in Athens in 1896, all the way to Tokyo 2020. 

Each episode covers one of the Summer Games..

It can be especially useful to binge on this series now, whilst the vocabulary surrounding the Olympics is fresh in your mind. 

French Expat

This popular podcast should resonate with everyone who has moved to France from abroad, regardless of their country of origin. 

Each week, the hosts of the podcast talk to someone who has moved to France and explore different issues and experiences they face.

Discussions include how children of expats stay connected to France while living abroad, and some of the big, small, and largely unexpected culture shocks people face after landing in the country.

This common ground makes the podcast an enjoyable experience, and will open you up to many different types of French accents, both from Francophones and more generally from people around the world.

How to Language 

While this series does not focus specifically on French, you are sure to gain more insight into language learning and how our brains comprehend new languages. 

Understanding these processes can be an invaluable method to quickly improving your French skills.

Hosted by two language teachers who use research to inform their conversations, subjects include the four main skills associated with language learning and the intermediate plateau. 

It is a great podcast to help understand the method behind language learning and will hopefully help you to improve your learning environment.

Read more: Man who speaks 50 languages gives his tips on learning French