13 French expressions involving numbers

Use these expressions and show off your language and your maths skills at the same time

Être haut comme trois pommes

Literal translation: To be as high as three apples

English equivalent: To be knee-high to a grasshopper

Jamais deux sans trois

Literal translation: Never two without three

English equivalent: Bad things always come in threes

Voir trente-six chandelles

Literal translation: To see 36 candles

English equivalent: To see stars

Ça ne casse pas trois pattes à un canard

Literal translation: It doesn’t break three feet of a duck

English equivalent: It’s nothing to write home about

Avoir les deux pieds dans le même sabot

Literal translation: To have both feet in the same clog

English equivalent: To be lacking in get up and go

Un de ces quatre

Literal translation: One of these four

English equivalent: One of these days

À deux à l’heure

Literal translation: At two at the hour

English equivalent: At a snail’s pace

Se mettre en quatre

Literal translation: To put oneself in four

English equivalent: To bend over backwards, to go out of your way

Chercher midi à quatorze heures

Literal translation: To search for midday at 2pm

English equivalent: To complicate things, do things the hard way

Cent fois sur le métier remets ton ouvrage

Literal translation: One hundred times on the job returns your result

English equivalent: If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again

Vivre à cent à l’heure

Literal translation: To live to 100 to the hour

English equivalent: To live life in the fast lane

Se mettre sur son trente-et-un

Literal translation: To put oneself on their 31

English equivalent: To get dressed up to the nines

En deux temps trois mouvements

Literal translation: In two times three movements

English equivalent: In no time at all, in two shakes of a lamb’s tail

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