Curiosities of the French language: How to say Happy New Year?

It is time to wish friends and neighbours Happy New Year, so how will you say it - an or année? 

You have probably already heard the phrase bonne année, so you may already know the answer, but do you know why?

The word ‘year’ in French has two options: an, which is a calendar reference, and année, which is a span of 12 months. 

Read more: What is the difference between being bilingual and fluent?

When to use an and when to use année

To give your age in French, you probably learned j’ai douze ans, literally saying that you ‘have’ 12 years.

Your teacher may have explained that an is used like an accounting term, when you are giving the total, so it is always used after cardinal or ‘counting’ numbers (one, two, three etc).

What about année? This word is all about duration, so for me année feels rather like ‘a yearful’. 

If you are wishing someone a Happy New Year, you are wishing them an entire year full of happiness. If you are very enthusiastic, you say: Je vous souhaite une excellente année (you want their entire ‘yearful’ to be excellent).

Indeed, every time you want to describe a year with an adjective, you need année: a disastrous year is une année désastreuse, while a marvellous year would be une année merveilleuse. It is simply not possible to describe a year without using année.

Année is also used after ordinal numbers (first, second, third and so on). So in the third year of your studies, you would say je suis en troisième année d’études, and if it is your tenth year in France, c’est ma cinquième année en France. 

So much more could be said, but simply remember the sense that année focuses on the duration. When you see le nouvel an, it usually refers to the first day of the year, but la nouvelle année suggests the entire year ahead. 

Bonne année et bonne santé to you all!