French object pronoun order: me, le, lui, y, en

French object pronouns usually go before the conjugated verb, and when more than one appears, the order is fixed: me/te/se/nous/vous → le/la/les → lui/leur → y → en. So “I give it to him” is je le lui donne, not je lui le donne.

The common two-pronoun pattern

The most useful B1 pattern is direct object before indirect object:

Je donne le livre à Paul. → Je le lui donne.
I give the book to Paul. → I give it to him.

The object thing (le livre) becomes le; the person after à becomes lui. The order is le lui, never lui le.

Elle montre les photos aux enfants. → Elle les leur montre.
She shows the photos to the children. → She shows them to them.

In the passé composé

In compound tenses, the pronouns still go before the helper verb.

Je le lui ai donné.
I gave it to him.

Elle nous en a parlé.
She talked to us about it.

The past participle may agree with a preceding direct object in formal writing: les photos, elle les a montrées. The order itself does not change.

With an infinitive

When there is a conjugated verb plus an infinitive, the pronoun usually attaches to the infinitive it belongs to.

Je vais le lui donner.
I’m going to give it to him.

Tu peux m’en parler.
You can talk to me about it.

Ask which verb the pronoun completes. If it completes the infinitive, place it before that infinitive.

Common mistakes

Reversing le and lui

French says le lui, not lui le.

Je lui le donne. → Je le lui donne.
I give it to him.

Putting pronouns after the conjugated verb

In normal statements, object pronouns go before the verb.

Je donne le lui. → Je le lui donne.
I give it to him.

Moving the pronoun away from its infinitive

With an infinitive, put the pronoun before the infinitive when that is the verb it completes.

Je le vais acheter. → Je vais l’acheter.
I’m going to buy it.

If the first slot is still fuzzy, review me, te and se before stacking pronouns. Fluera trains these in tiny sentence transformations, so the fixed order becomes a movement you recognize, not a table you rebuild every time. Try it when you practice French.

Practice