# mobile / portable (téléphone)



## macdevster

Can anyone weigh in now in February of 2013 and say if "*mobile*" is definitely more common than "*portable*" now in French-speaking countries?


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## Santana2002

In my part of France (Bretagne), I would say it's predominately, if not exclusively, *'portable'*.


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## petit1

I never hear anyone say "mobile", always "portable". (ex. _Hé! Il y a ton portable qui sonne_!)


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## xmarabout

No, in Belgium (and in French TV or radios) the use of "portable" is still common. In Belgium, it is even more common than "mobile" in the everyday life. As synonyms in a standard conversation, you also have "téléphone", "smartphone" (use as a general term)


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## Philippides

I (parisien, 40 ans) would rather say "*mobile*"


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## Bordelais

petit1 said:


> I never hear anyone say "mobile", always "portable". (ex. _Hé! Il y a ton portable qui sonne_!)



I don't doubt it, but would just point out that French operators like SFR insist on "mobile" on their websites: for example "changer de mobile".


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## Sedulia

Here in Paris I mostly hear people say "portable."


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## xmarabout

I agree with Bordelais about the operators but the public doesn't follow the operators so far... In Belgium, very common is the word *GSM* (even on the website of the Belgian operators).

_Prête-moi ton GSM que j'envoie un message !
Changer votre GSM sans changer de numéro !_


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## Rainbow-Road

In France, “mobile” is only used by some mobile network operators or other retailers that sell cellphones [….]; *people will always use “(téléphone) portable”*. “mobile” sounds very outdated to me in informal French.


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## guillaumedemanzac

> people will _always_ use “(téléphone) portable”. “mobile” sounds very outdated to me in informal French.



I agree; in Aquitaine everyone says *portable* - even the new English settlers. We used to say *mobile* but have en masse converted by default to *portable *- with the correct French pronunciation of course because "port'ble" means something you can carry.


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## Philippides

Philipides said:


> I (parisien, 40 ans) would rather say "*mobile*"


I forgot to say that I work in the telecommunication sector. When I read all messages above, I understand that I am either outdated (un vieux con !) or maybe a bit odd


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## Lly4n4

Le seul moment où j'utiliserai "mobile" ce serait par opposition à "fixe". Sinon, "portable" - "mobile" a en effet un petit côté rétro  (désolée, Philipdes !)

_Tu peux me donner ton numéro de fixe et de mobile, s'il-te-plaît ?_


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## Rainbow-Road

Lly4n4 said:


> Le seul moment où j'utiliserai "mobile" ce serait par opposition à "fixe".
> _Tu peux me donner ton numéro de fixe et de mobile, s'il-te-plaît ?_


Bah, même là ça sonne un peu vieillot je trouve. Je dirais plutôt « Tu peux me donner ton (numéro de) fixe et ton portable ? ».


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## Philippides

Rainbow-Road said:


> Bah, même là ça sonne un peu vieillot je trouve. Je dirais plutôt « Tu peux me donner ton (numéro de) fixe et ton portable ? ».


Allez pour montrer que je ne suis pas complétement déconnecté de mon  époque, je mentionne qu'à l'oral, et dans un langage jeune en France, on  pourra dire « Tu peux me donner ton 06 ? » (les numéros de mobiles -et même ceux de portables  - commençant en général par 06).


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## Rainbow-Road

Avec l'arrivée des numéros en 07 en France, l'avenir de cette expression reste assez incertain ^^


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## Bordelais

Interesting that all the major French operators use "mobile" whereas the consensus here among native speakers seems to be firmly for "portable". Is "mobile" the result of some edict from the Académie Française?


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## petit1

It is rather to stress the difference with "fixe".


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## Sid.

Hello! 

Well, I can start by saying that I have not heard any person of my age saying 'mobile'. Young people really tend to use only the expression 'portable' to describe their cellphones. 
But, I know that 'mobile' is used, for example, I am pretty sure this is what appears in television advertising. Or what older people would say. (Not implying anything, this is a mere observation of fashion and language styles...)

But this makes me think of other terms related to the matter : 'sms' and 'texto'. 'Sms' which is directly taken from the English is, in French, used mostly by young people whereas 'texto' is mainly used by older people. In France, some expressions appear more catchy depending on your age, perhaps?


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## CarlosRapido

Au Canada, on dit cellulaire (influence anglo je crois) dans le langage familier, mais portable devient plus fréquent et, ici aussi les fournisseurs disent mobile.

nota; j'ai du chercher pour trouver la signification de *GSM*, je ne crois pas que ça soit compris hors Belgique.


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## Hildy1

Is "un portable" still used to mean a computer? If so, is there any way other than context to distinguish between a portable telephone and a portable computer?


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## bazalpin

Hildy1 said:


> is there any way other than context to distinguish between a portable telephone and a portable computer?


*I'm afraid there is none*


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## Nicomon

Hildy1 said:


> Is "un portable" still used to mean a computer? If so, is there any way other than context to distinguish between a portable telephone and a portable computer?


 Actually, it may be one of the reasons why we say « _(téléphone) cellulaire _» in Quebec.

Unless the context is very clear, I would understand «_ portable _» as "portable computer / laptop".

Then again, this is copied from Termium - *cell phone* : 





> Tous les téléphones cellulaires sont portables, mais tous les téléphones portables ne sont pas des cellulaires


 So I guess one way to distinguish between computer and telephone for those who don't say _cellulaire _is indeed to say _mobile_ for the telephone.

*Edit :* I just found this *previous thread *(and the last post leads to another).


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## petit1

For the portable computer, I say "portable" or, more rarely, "ordinateur portable".


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## djweaverbeaver

I've also hear *un portable* in France and *un natel* in Switzerland.  I've only come across _le (télephone) mobile_ in ads and my phone bill.  In my opinion this mirrors the usage of courriel and mail/mél/courrier éléctronique/e-mail in France: the first one is only used officially by the French government, its services, and the _Académie française_; everyone else uses one of the other options in normal conversation and writing.


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## SilverDuck

That might not be really relevant to your question, but if you go to Switzerland, *natel* is definitely the most used word.

I would use *portable* to reffer to a laptop computer. Again, it’s probably just a regionalism.

Have a nice day,
SilverDuck


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## xmarabout

CarlosRapido said:


> nota; j'ai du chercher pour trouver la signification de *GSM*, je ne crois pas que ça soit compris hors Belgique.



Si, tout le monde comprendra de quel appareil vous voulez parler (même un enfant) par contre, rare seront ceux qui savent ce que ces initiales signifient (Global System for Mobile Communications qui est normalement une norme de la 2G) voir aussi ce qu'en dit wikipedia.
A la réflection, en Belgique, les termes "portable" et "mobile" font un peu pédant.


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## petit1

Je suis un dinosaure de France et si quelqu'un me parle de "natel" je ne saurai pas de quoi on parle.


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## Nicomon

petit1 said:


> For the portable computer, I say "portable" [...]


 Comme moi, donc. Mais j'ai remarqué au début de ce fil que tu le disais pour le téléphone aussi. 

Carlos semble penser que c'est sous l'influence de l'anglais qu'on dit « _cellulaire_ » au Québec/Canada. Or « _portable_ » est tout aussi influencé de l'anglais. Sauf que... les _portables/mobiles _ne sont pas tous _cellulaires. _

Il en est aussi question dans *cet autre fil*. 

De toutes façons, bientôt plus personne n'aura de téléphone fixe, et on remplacera peut-être alors les _mobile, cellulaire, portable, GSM, Natel_, etc. par... _téléphone_.


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## guillaumedemanzac

*Cell-phone* is American not English - British English is still *mobile* (phone). 
Perhaps that's why Canadian French is cellulaire for a mobile phone.


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## Nicomon

guillaumedemanzac said:


> *Cell-phone* is American not English - British English is still *mobile* (phone).
> Perhaps that's why Canadian French is cellulaire for a mobile phone.


 I agree that « _cellulaire_ » (we also shorten it to _cell_ as in « _J'ai oublié mon cell _» comes from _cell-phone_. 

But _mobile_ (although not as common) is also said in American/Canadian English. It is one of the appellation listed on the page from Termium that I linked to above. And also at the bottom on this *page* from which I extracted what follows : 


> Lorsqu'on peut tenir dans une seule main un appareil cellulaire, on utilise pour le désigner le terme _téléphone cellulaire portatif_ ou son synonyme _téléphone cellulaire portable_.
> 
> En Europe, c'est la forme réduite _portable_ qui est la plus utilisée.
> 
> Bien qu'il désigne au sens large tout appareil téléphonique qu'on utilise en se déplaçant, le terme _téléphone mobile_ est le plus souvent employé comme synonyme de _téléphone cellulaire_.


 It would appear that we kept the first part of _téléphone cellulaire portable_ and that Europeans kept the last.


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## saquiwej

I am confronted with the same dilemma as Hildy1. If some French person still following this thread, could give some explanation. If I say: _J'ai perdu mon portable._ People will assume that I am talking about my mobile phone, won't they? Just because many more people carry around with them their mobile phones than their laptops. So, _portable_ by default means a mobile phone.


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## petit1

Yes, *saquiwej*, by default, it means a mobile phone. With "_perdu_" it can't be anything else because of the size of the object. Unless you are really very absent-minded you don't "_lose_" your portable computer; you'd rather think it has been stolen and say: "_On m'a piqué mon ordi_".


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## SilverDuck

I concur with *petit1*. If I were to lose my laptop, the natural way to say it to me would be _«J’ai perdu mon pc portable»_ as just _«portable»_ would feel like the phone.

In the phone case, I think that nowadays it is more and more common to hear the word _«smartphone»_ even in French (don’t forget the French accent on top of it). I’d say _«J’ai perdu mon smartphone»_ or _«J’ai perdu mon natel»_ (if I’m with swiss folks). At least I guess that’s what people in their twenties would say.

Bye.


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## Jean-Michel Carrère

If there a risk of ambiguity, then the speaker can also specify "*ordi* portable" if he or she means "laptop".


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## Michelvar

So, as there is an ambiguity, you would have to say "J'ai perdu mon ordinateur portable / ordi / laptop / notebook". Among people working in English on a daily basis (air transport, international shipping, ...), "laptop" and "notebook" are used in French to prevent this ambiguity.


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## Oddmania

Notez que si l'on parle d'un ordinateur, il suffit de dire _J'ai perdu mon ordi(nateur)._ Si vous êtes dans un aéroport ou dans une université, on se doute bien que vous ne parlez pas d'un gros PC de bureau (ce serait difficile à perdre).


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## Nicomon

Dans la même logique qu'Oddmania... si vous dites _j'ai perdu mon téléphone_, on se doutera bien que vous n'avez pas perdu votre téléphone fixe / à fil. 

Si j'entendais :   _On m'a piqué/je me suis fait voler mon portable_... moi je comprendrais_ ordi / laptop. 
_
Si le portable en question a été _perdu, _alors oui, je comprendrais téléphone. Mais si c'était moi qui l'avait perdu, je dirais autre chose que _portable__. 
_
_Portable_ ne veut pas dire téléphone par défaut, à Montréal.


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## Pedro y La Torre

I've always preferred québécois usage in this regard (as in many others). Un cell(ulaire) is absolutely unambiguous whereas portable can sometimes lead to misunderstandings (rare, admittedly, but still).

Similarly _téléphone intelligent_ has always seemed more appropriate to me than "un smartphone".


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## guillaumedemanzac

Another point is the meaning of mobile in English - with the English not the French pronunciation.  It means anything moving .  He's much more mobile than he was after the landmine incident - with his new prosthetic limbs he won gold in a faster time than most non-handicapped runners.

Mobile (pronounced French style) is a town in Texas where they do everything differently according to the song : "In Mobile, In Mobile, In Mo, In Mo, In Mo, In Mobile, They tie them up with string, And they let the buggers swing, In Mobile, In Mobile."

Mobile in French therefore means "Moveable" :  Mobilier for the moveable contents of a property, Immobilier for the walls and non-moveable parts of a property. So mobilier means furniture.  (I realise all of you know that but ).


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