Teste ton niveau de français avec des objets
A1 French listening practice · French · Curated for beginners
What does “appareil photo” mean in French?
The everyday French for a stills camera is not one word but two: un appareil photo. Appareil means device or apparatus, and photo is simply parked next to it — no preposition, no hyphen. The head word is the reusable part: un appareil dentaire is braces, un appareil auditif is a hearing aid, un appareil ménager is a household appliance, un appareil photo is a camera.
Une caméra exists in French but normally means a film or video camera, so the two are not interchangeable. In speech the phrase often gets trimmed to just mon appareil when the context is obvious. For the act itself, both prendre une photo and faire une photo are common. This clip uses it as a mid-difficulty item in a name-the-object quiz, between la tasse and un briquet.