All About Aimer

All about Aimer

Aimer is one of the most common French verbs. It is a regular -ER verb, requires avoir in the compound tenses, and can mean "to like" or "to love." There is a little bit of a trick to using aimer correctly with people and direct object pronouns which you will learn about in this lesson.
Using aimer
Aimer means "to like" or "to love" when followed by a noun or infinitive.

J'aime Paris - I love Paris
Il aime les chats - He likes cats
Aimes-tu voyager ? - Do you like to travel?

I love you
When aimer is followed by a person, it means "to love" or "to be in love with." You can use aimer to mean simply "love" with your family, but with other people, it means "in love," so if that's not what you mean, you will need to qualify it (see below).

J'aime Luc (mon frère)
I love Luc (my brother)
Il aime Chantal
He's in love with Chantal
Je t'aime !
I love you!

I like you
To say that you "like" or are "fond of" someone, qualify aimer with an adverb, such as assez, bien, or beaucoup. These adverbs make aimer less strong, so that they can be used with friends rather than family and lovers.

J'aime assez Paul
I kind of like Paul
J'aime bien Ana
I like Ana
J'aime beaucoup Étienne
I really like Étienne
Je t'aime bien
I like you

Aimer with direct objects
The direct object pronounsle, la, and les can only be used with aimer when they refer to people. The meaning of aimer with a direct object pronoun is the same as explained above.

Je l'aime !
I love him/her!
Je l'aime bien
I like him/her

When the direct object means "it" (because you are replacing a non-human noun or a verb), you cannot use a direct object pronoun; instead, you must use the indefinite demonstrative pronounça.

Aimes-tu le tennis ? Oui, j'aime ça
Do you like tennis? Yes, I like it
Nous voyageons beaucoup, nous aimons ça
We travel a lot, we like it
Je t'ai écrit un poème - tu aimes ça ?
I wrote you a poem - do you like it?

Aimer in the conditional
In the conditional, aimer is a polite way to make a request or state a desire

J'aimerais partir à midi
I would like to leave at noon
Aimeriez-vous manger avec nous?
Would you like to eat with us?

S'aimer
The pronominal verbs'aimer can be reflexive or reciprocal.
1. Reflexive: to like oneself

Je m'aime en bleu
I like myself (how I look) in blue
Il ne s'aime pas
He doesn't like himself (has low self-esteem)

2. Reciprocal: to be in love, to love one another

Nous nous aimons
We are in love
Penses-tu qu'ils s'aiment ?
Do you think they are in love?

Expressions with aimer

aimer à la folie - to be madly in love
aimer autant - to be just as happy (with, that), to prefer
aimer mieux - to prefer
Qui aime bien châtie bien (proverb) - Spare the rod and spoil the child
Qui m'aime aime mon chien (proverb) - Love me, love my dog

Conjugations
Present tense

j'aime
tuaimes
il aime
nousaimons
vousaimez
ilsaiment