Familiar means known to you or easy to recognise: a familiar face is a face you know, and to be familiar with something is to know it well. The word can also mean “too informal with someone”, but in that sense it usually comes with too. Without it, familiar is understood as “known”.
familiar: will you get the meaning right?
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look/sound/seem + familiar; be familiar to + person; be familiar with + something; a familiar face/voice/place; too familiar (with + person)
- On my first day in the new office, I was happy to see a familiar face.
- Are you familiar with Excel, or should I show you the basics?
- The streets of my home town looked familiar, but most of the old shops had gone.
What changed
First versionThis song sounds familiar for me, but I can't remember what it's called.
RevisionThis song sounds familiar to me, but I can't remember what it's called.
It is tempting to write familiar for me, but when familiar means “seeming known”, the preposition after it is to: familiar to me. Only the preposition has changed.
To describe someone who is too casual with people, English uses too: He was a bit too familiar with my colleagues. If a person is simply relaxed and easy to talk to, say informal or friendly: Our manager is very informal.
Your turn
I've used this program for five years, so I'm very familiar ___ all its features.
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with — The subject here is I, the person who knows the program, so the answer is familiar with. Familiar to is used when the subject is the thing itself: The program is familiar to me.
Describe a place that seemed familiar although you were there for the first time. Say what the place was and why it seemed familiar.
When I first visited the old market in Riga, it looked familiar to me, because my grandmother had shown me photos of it when I was a child.
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