Are you extremely tired searching google for French accents to copy and paste into your document? Sometimes, you just want to type a quick message and neglect accents because it’s bothersome to remember ALT codes.
No fancy French keyboard required and no settings to switch. This stuff is built into your Macbook.
How else could I write articles here or type French papers with such ease?
THE TWO CRUCIAL STEPS
There are two steps required to type French accents on your mac device.
First, you must hold down the option key and then click on a certain letter. The letter depends on the desired accent (you’ll see the combinations in the next section).
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THEN, you release the two keys you were just holding down. The accent should appear on the screen although it will be hovering over nothing… you need to assign a letter to the accent!
Now type in the letter you want the accent to receive. It’s that simple!
How to Produce French Accents
Cedilla: (ç)
Option key + letter c. No additional letter needs to follow.
Accent Aigu: (é)
Option key + letter e at the same time. Release all the keys you held down. Now click the e again.
Accent Grave: (à, è, ù)
Option key + ` (found in the top left of your keyboard, on the key with the tilde). Followed by a, e, or u.
Circumflex: (â, ê, î, ô, û)
Option key + letter i. Followed by a, e, i, o, or u.
Trema: (ë, ï, ü)
Option key + letter u. Followed by e, i, or u.
oe ligature: (œ)
Option key + letter q.
EXTRA EXAMPLES
While holding the option key, click “e” once (just as if you were typing the letter “e”).
Release both the option key and e. Now say I wanted this accent I just produced to go above an “i.” I would type in an “i” in the same manner I normally would, except this time the letter would receive the desired accent.
Pro tip: In order to make any of the accented letters capitalized, all you have to do is hold down the shift key when typing in the letter you want to assign the accent to.
Conclusion
At first glance, this all may be a little to much to take in now, don’t worry! Keep referencing back here if you forget which keys to use and you’ll be naturally typing accents even FASTER than when using a French keyboard.
These are all the skills I used to make typing French accents on mac computers.
Macs rock!
Bless you!!! Spent the last 25 minutes following useless, resultless instructions at several sites. Was ready to throw in the towel, and then boom! Your simple, useful explanation. Seriously, thank you :)
How do we make French quotation marks?
When I press “option” and the letter “o” I get “ø”. How do I get it to put the circumflex above it instead?
Hey Amy,
You have to do Option + “I” then press “o.” to get a circumflex accent (ˆ) over the letter.
Something I find WAY easier than all of this – just hold down the letter you want to add the accent to … for example, hold down the letter “e” … wait for a second … then you’ll see a little bubble up – click the accent you want and you’re done. :)
Yes, this is also a great option and it works on both iOS, my Macbook and my desktop. The thing is it kinda ruins my quick flow of typing to wait for the accents now that I’ve gotten used to using the system above. I may consider adding your method to the actual article itself David. Thanks :)
Thanks for the great guidance. This has made things a lot easier for me. Just a comment on the comment above. When I click on e and wait, I just get more es and no little box with accents.
I’ll create a little cheat sheet and will be off to the races. What once scared me, is now so much easier and like you, it’s become second nature.
well that’s awesome
Not possible on my iphone?
Hello to type French accents from an iPhone, you hold down the letter you want to add an accent to and then you’ll see a whole set of accent options you could apply to the letter.
To make things easier for yourself, add a French keyboard to your iPhone (General –> Keyboard –> Keyboard –> Add New Keyboard…) and that way when you type in French it’ll spell check and add accents for you without reverting your French words to English ones.
I hope that helped.
I have always used the “holding down the letter until the options appear” way of doing accents. But in the last 10 or so days, my computer has stopped complying and just runs a series of letters across the page.
I agree that the above option is far easier than using the Options button because it doesn’t stop the flow of thought when writing!
I’ve recently encountered the same problem on my MacBook Air – holding down the letter no longer shows the letter options with accents, it just repeats the letter. What happened? That was such a great feature.
Thank you ever so much !!!!!!!
You saved my nerves tonight. I was about to go completely crazy, as a proper French person ;)
This doesn’t work on my Mac Air for accent grave (and maybe other accents.
option + ` gives me the scandinavian å which can’t be edited.
The keys you press to get å are option + a, and if you are doing option + ` and it gives you å instead of à, then maybe try option + a to get the accent grave. Maybe it’s been switched somehow
Are you sure you’re not trying to do this in one step? It’s two distinct steps.
“option + ~” and then a, not “option + a.”
When you do option + a you’ll get å.
Believe me, it works as described above.
This is great however, please amend it to include how to type the euro symbol: € (option/shift 2) and the French quotation marks: (les guillemets) Opening quotation marks: Hold Option key. Type \ and for Closing quotation marks: Hold Option and Shift Key. Type \ (They would not appear in this field.)
(And if you didn’t answer the person who asked about typing an accent mark on a capital letter, you just can’t do it with caps lock on.)
How do I type the French quotation marks in Word that includes an automatic non-breaking space?
Typing option + \ would produce « but I still need to enter option + space to get that non-breaking space after it.
Thanks
Thank you so much as I was getting frustrated to type in French an iOS Mac. Now that you’ve explained so simply, I feel confident in typing in my very own native language …
This doesn’t work on my keyboard for either circumflex or trema. Also for accent I only need to press option + e, without need to press e again as instructed!
This works for a small e but not for a capital E. You are not spelling out the difference in your blog and it doesn’t work!!!
Nice write up. However, I find these keyboard combinations a bit clunky and using them slows down my typing. There is another option. Simply go into system preferences, keyboard, input sources and install the US International PC virtual keyboard. Once it’s installed, activate it by clicking on the current keyboard icon in the menu bar. Now you can type French accents as follows:
‘ (apostrophe) followed by a vowel gives that vowel with accent aigu
‘ (apostrophe) followed by c gives you ç
`(backquote) followed by a,e,u gives you that vowel with accent grave
ˆ(caret) followed by a vowel gives you that vowel with accent circonflex
” (double quote) followed by a vowel gives you that vowel with accent tréma
You’ll still need the ALT codes to do œ, Œ, « and » though.
John,
Thanks for this guide. It’s the best one for the Mac that I have found. Very detailed! I’m so glad I don’t have to cut and paste the letters from other docs anymore to get the accents.
Merci bien!
NO it does not work. I wish to use circumflex a. When I use Option-i, I get the accent. When I release and type a, it types an a in a new space. The circumflex hangs in the air!
This is a mystery!
I’ve tried the same sequence in both Word and Pages and in both I achieved the correct â. Click and hold ALT and I together, then release and the ^ appears. Then type an A immediately: â.
Good luck!
I’m using mac and I’m trying to get word, how do you get it?
If you are using mac depending on what you are doing you can just hold the letter that you want an accent on down and select the one you want. Also on some other computers you can change the keyboard to french (computers like chromebooks).
Great information. But I can’t seem to find a way to put accents on capital letters. Can you help? Thanks
Hi, how do you indicate the arrondissement in an address when typing on a mac keyboard; am I interpreting it correctly that it’s a tiny superscript “e”?
Superscripts are usually not active, but if you open up Pages or Microsoft word then you can create a superscript by doing COMMAND, CONTROL and the PLUS KEY at the same time. You can also go to the settings of your word processor and there should be an option to insert a superscript/subscript. I usually just do the latter.
How do you type 0ͦ (zero no letter o) for degree on a US keyboard?
The degree sign is holding the option key then “0” the number.. so 40ºC for example
John, you are a God-send !! Plus having won a whole host of brownie-points!!!!
You cannot know the number or times I have asked the same question about typing French on a “qwerty” keyboard” and invariably getting the same answer: use the French “Azerty” keyboard which is a nightmare when you touch-type and use both French and English all the time.
Many many thanks for putting us on the right track. This is really fantastic
Have a great day et Merci encore
Hallelujah! Finally a website that explain this whole process logically and helpfully! I might actually be able to write things in a more accurate fashion. Thank you ever so much! Might I post a link to Facebook?
Yes you may – enjoy your new-found Mac capabilities :)
It’s working for me, I had to give it a few tries depending which letter I want, but in the end, it works and I’m very happy.
Now to memorize these by heart!
I can use the shortcut for é etc correctly but cannot get à on a shortcut. I am using a smaller keyboard, hence there is no ‘ on the top left as you describe. Perhaps that is why. The à is one I use regularly so would really like to know a shortcut. Thank you.
Me too and our enthusiastic Mac user doesn’t seem to have an answer for us.
If I use the key marked ‘ underneath the ” symbol which is also on it, I get æe which is definitely not an e with a grave accent.
I have found the grave key on my keyboard.
It is between the left-shift and Z just left from the alt key.
It works as advertised.
I am just transferring from PC to Mac and the process is a combination in PC too, (Alt+0232) so marginally less elegant than Mac-world.
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I have been searching for this key on my MacBook Air and never thought to look on the bottom left instead of the top left!
This information is super, thank you!
You just showed me how to do something I’ve always wanted to do but thought it was not possible. It works great! Thank you
How do we make the capital E with l’accent aigu?
Do the option + e command for the aigu mark then make your “E” capitalized (like normal) by holding down the shift key when you type it.
Tried that. Doesn’t work. The accent appears before the letter instead of on it.
I have been trying to get this right for so long. Even Apple’s own instructions don’t make it clear that it’s a two-stage process, not helped by the fact that they insist on calling the ALT key ‘Options’.
Merci mille fois.
No problem! I love using a Mac because it’s so easy to type accents. I struggle a bit more on my window’s desktop.
Works wonderfully. Thank you.
This wouldn’t work for me
Really? I used this just now (and for the past few years) because running a site about French requires typing accents all day!
It’s a 2-step process.
Make sure you hold down the option key and then click one letter referring to the accent you want.
THEN
Release all those keys and click the letter you want the accent to go above.
I may make a video to better clarify this concept.
Thanks so much! This was really helpful :)
No problem! Glad it can help you guys :)
Your article is quite helpful to me. I have bought a laptop as well as french keyboard. I really like to write french language but i didn’t knew that how to type. Now i have got some tactic tips from you. Thanks for sharing your experience with us.