voici

French

Etymology

Literally, “look here”. From vois (“see!, look!”), second-person singular imperative of voir (“to see, to look”) and ici (“here”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /vwa.si/

• audio

  (file)

Verb

voici (defective)

1. here is

   Voici le fromage.

   Here's the cheese.

Usage notes

• Voici is a defective verb; its only conjugation is in the present indicative tense, even though it can appear in phrases that imply another tense.
• As a verb, it can take direct object pronouns:

  Tu m’as appelé, me voici! ― You called me, and here I am!

• It can also occur in relative clauses:

  l’homme que voici ― the man who is here/this man (right) here

• It is used to designate a person or object near the speaker, in contrast to voilà which is mainly used to introduce a slightly distant person or object.
• In face-to-face conversations where both participants can see the subject of the conversation, voici is often replaced by voilà.

Derived terms

• voici que

Preposition

voici

1. ago

   Synonym: il y a

   Il est parti voici trois jours. ― He left three days ago.

See also

• revoici
• voilà

Further reading

• “voici”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.