Manquer in French: why tu me manques means I miss you

Manquer looks like “to miss”, but the sentence structure is reversed. In French, the person or thing missed is the subject, and the person who feels the absence is an indirect object. So tu me manques literally means “you are missing to me”, which naturally translates as “I miss you”.

French Literal logic Natural English
Tu me manques. You are missing to me. I miss you.
Je te manque ? Am I missing to you? Do you miss me?
Ma famille me manque. My family is missing to me. I miss my family.
Paris nous manque. Paris is missing to us. We miss Paris.

The missed person is the subject

Start with the person or thing that is absent. That noun or pronoun controls the verb form.

Tu me manques beaucoup.
I miss you a lot.

Mes amis me manquent.
I miss my friends.

The verb changes because tu is singular in the first sentence and mes amis is plural in the second.

The person who misses uses an indirect object pronoun

The person who feels the absence is expressed with me, te, lui, nous, vous or leur.

English French
I miss her Elle me manque.
She misses me Je lui manque.
We miss them Ils nous manquent.
They miss us Nous leur manquons.

This is the same indirect-object logic you see in other French pronoun systems: lui can mean “to him” or “to her”, and leur means “to them”.

Manquer de: to lack, run short of

Manquer de has a different structure and means “to lack”, “to be short of” or “to run out of”.

Nous manquons de temps.
We are short of time.

Il manque de confiance.
He lacks confidence.

Do not use the reverse “I miss you” pattern here. In manquer de, the subject is the person or situation that lacks something.

Common mistakes

Translating word for word from English

English says “I miss you”, but French starts with “you”.

Je manque toi. -> Tu me manques.
I miss you.

Forgetting plural agreement

The missed person or thing controls the verb.

Mes parents me manque. -> Mes parents me manquent.
I miss my parents.

Mixing up lui and le/la

The person who misses is an indirect object, so use lui, not le or la.

Je la manque. -> Elle me manque. / Je lui manque.
I miss her. / She misses me.

Manquer is a good place to connect verb meaning with pronoun position. If the indirect-object forms feel shaky, review me, te, se in French and French object pronoun order. Fluera practices manquer in short emotional sentences, so the person who is absent and the person who feels it stay visible. Try it when you practice French.

Practice

Question 1 of 10

I miss you.

Frequently asked questions

Why does tu me manques mean I miss you?
In French, the missed person is the subject. Tu me manques literally means "you are missing to me", so the natural English translation is "I miss you".
How do you say she misses me in French?
Say Je lui manque. The person missed is je, and the person who feels the absence is lui ("to her").
How do you say I miss my family?
Say Ma famille me manque. The missed thing, ma famille, is the subject.
What does manquer de mean?
Manquer de means "to lack" or "to be short of": nous manquons de temps ("we are short of time"), il manque de confiance ("he lacks confidence").