How to Type French Accents on Word

Many students who need to write French assignments have asked me how to type French accents on Word. I have already written an article about How to Type French accents on an Apple iPhone / iPad, which you can read here.

I’ve asked my husband to write a post about it as he is the one who helps me out with all the tech parts! (For myself, I use a French keyboard.)

Here’s the easiest way to type French accents on Word

With the following method, you won’t need to memorise a heap of random numbers to use ALT key “shortcuts”, and you won’t need to change your keyboard to a French AZERTY keyboard and then have to learn where all the keys are again. (Yay!)

The only catch is that it only works in Microsoft Word, but you can then copy and paste your text and use it in the application you want. We have only used it in Windows, and have not tested it on a Apple Mac, but the process might be similar (leave a comment below if you’ve tested in on an Mac!)

Basic Recipe

The basic recipe for each accent is as follows:

Hold down the “CTRL” key and keep it held down.
Tap and release the punctuation mark which looks the most like the accent you need.
Tap and release the letter which will have the accent.
Let go of the “CTRL” key.

Each of the punctuation marks looks very similar to the accent that it represents so that should make it very easy to remember off the top of your head! 😉

Examples

If you want an “é” with a accent aigu, in Word:

Hold down the “CTRL” key and keep it held down
tap on ‘
tap on e
let go of the “CTRL” key

If you want an “è” with a accent grave, in Word

Hold down the “CTRL” key and keep it held down
tap on ` (It’s next to the number 1 key on your keyboard)
tap on e
let go of the “CTRL” key

If you want a “ç” with the cédille, in Word

Hold down the “CTRL” key and keep it held down
tap on ,
tap on c
let go of the “CTRL” key

If you want a “â” with the accent circonflexe, in Word

Hold down the “CTRL” key and keep it held down
tap on ^ (You need to hold down “SHIFT” while tapping on the number “6“)
tap on a
let go of the “CTRL” key

If you want a “ë” with the tréma, in Word

Hold down the “CTRL” key and keep it held down
tap on : (to do this one you need hold down “SHIFT” while tapping on the semi-colon 😉
tap on e
let go of the “CTRL” key