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False Friends Bank
🤝 False Friends Bank
False friends (faux amis) are words that look identical or almost identical to English words — but mean something entirely different. They appear in AQA reading passages precisely because examiners know students will glance at them and assume they know the meaning. Recognising even ten of these reliably can be worth several marks across Paper 3.
The Core False Friends List — AQA GCSE Priority
Elle a trouvé un stage dans une entreprise formidable — les collègues étaient très sympathiques.
Earn the mark scheme marks
💡 Exam Tips & Common Errors
- False friends appear in AQA passages where the surrounding context makes the wrong meaning plausible — read the full sentence.
- The most tested false friends at GCSE are: actuellement, sensible, sympathique, rester, stage, librairie, déception.
- When translating (Paper 3 translation task), a false friend in your answer often costs 1 mark — and often tips the whole sentence into inaccuracy.
- Word families can help: sensibilité (sensitivity), sensiblement (noticeably) — all point to the "sensitive" meaning, not "sensible".
- In multiple-choice questions, examiners put the false friend translation as a distractor option — always verify against context.
❌ Common error: Reading Il reste à la maison and translating it as "He rests at home."
✓ Correct: Rester = to stay/remain. The correct translation is "He stays at home." To say "he rests", you need Il se repose à la maison.
Why it costs marks: This error changes the meaning of the sentence entirely. On a short-answer or translation question, writing "rests" when the text means "stays" is an inaccuracy that loses the mark for that segment.