What does “ça te vieillit” mean in French?

Assumer ses cheveux blancs qui arrivent avec l’âge

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A2 French listening practice · Québec French · Picked for people who know a little

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ça te vieillit
French appearance verb
“it makes you look older” — vieillir aimed at someone else

On its own, vieillir means to grow old. Aim it at someone else and it flips to “make look older”: ça te vieillit is what people say about grey hair, a haircut or a coat — “it ages you.” French runs a whole family of appearance verbs this way, so a garment can te grossir (make you look bigger) or te rajeunir (make you look younger) with no extra words.

The same verbs turn reflexive when the effect is deliberate: se vieillir de deux ans is making yourself look older on purpose. And vieillir keeps a kinder reading for things rather than people — wine, cheese and leather vieillissent bien, which is a compliment.

How common are the words?

How common are the words in this A2 French listening practice video?

96.8%
of words are in the top 2,000 most common French words
Most of the words in this video are common French words.

How common in written French

91.6%
Top 1,000
96.8%
Top 2,000
97.9%
Top 5,000

How common in spoken French

92.4%
Top 1,000
98.9%
Top 2,000
100%
Top 5,000

Harder words in this video

These words are harder than A2. Here is what they mean.

coiffeur
1×
Not in top 5,000People say this a lot
hairdresser
vieillit
1×
Not in top 5,000
naturellement
1×
Top 5,000People say this a lot
naturally
ça te vieillit
1×
it makes you look older

Source: wordfreq 3.1.1 (general) · Lexique 3.83 (spoken). These numbers are close, not perfect.

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