What is the difference between bonne chance and bon courage?

Bonne chance wishes luck when the result is uncertain. Bon courage wishes courage for something demanding.

What does bon courage literally mean?

Good courage. It is closer to hang in there than to good luck.

French · phrasebook

How to say good luck in French

Good luck in French is bonne chance. French also has bon courage, which English translates the same way and which means something else: not luck, but strength for a hard or long task.

Aurélien CuvelierSep 19, 2026

bonne chance

good luck

anyone

The ways to say it

bonne chance

good luck

anyone

bon courage

hang in there, good luck with the effort

anyone

How to use it

The two exchanges below draw the line. Before a maths exam, where the outcome is uncertain, the wish is bonne chance. To someone staying at the office until ten at night, the wish is bon courage: nothing is left to chance there, the person only has to get through it.

Watch out

Wishing bonne chance to someone facing plain hard work can sound as if you doubt them. When effort is the issue, the phrase is bon courage.

In a real conversation

Each exchange is a line and its reply. Greyed letters are written and not pronounced. A tie marks a liaison, with the sound you hear under it. A label under a verb names its tense when it is not the present.

J'ai mon examen de maths demain matin.I have my maths exam tomorrow morning.Bonne chance ! Tu vas réussir.Good luck! You're going to pass.

Je reste au bureau jusqu'à vingt-deux heures.I'm staying at the office until ten at night.Bon courage ! Je vous laisse travailler.Good luck! I'll leave you to work.

Questions people ask

What is the difference between bonne chance and bon courage?: Bonne chance wishes luck when the result is uncertain. Bon courage wishes courage for something demanding.
What does bon courage literally mean?: Good courage. It is closer to hang in there than to good luck.

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Written by

Aurélien Cuvelier Founder, NuanceDeck

Aurélien Cuvelier builds NuanceDeck: the app, and the verification pipeline behind its dictionary. Every entry is grounded in the official TORFL lexical minimum and a 20,000-word frequency corpus, and every example sentence passes a certification review before it ships.

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