Octante was taught for a while in France at the beginning of the 20th century, but it never really caught on. Old people in Brittany used to use it sometimes as well, but it has completely disappeared everywhere now. It does sound nicer and more natural to me than huitante.

Many French people believe that it is used in Belgium and Switzerland though, for some reason, but as far as I know that's not true (I live in Belgium, although not in a French speaking region).

Thanks. At least I know I didn't imagine it.

I make a disservice to Pascale, the first lady who taught me French, and who was, herself French, by saying it was a Belgian woman who taught me French. The Belgian lady, Catherine, taught me _most_ of my French but I first started speaking French with Pascale.

Which is to say, it's possible I learned "octante" from Pascale, although she was far from old enough to have learned it in the early 20th century.

So I'm guessing "octante" is still used in some French-speaking places, although not that widely.

And I'll probably sound rather quaint if I use it myself :)

[For the record, I'm Greek but I learned French very early on because my dad had cousins in the Greek diplomatic corps and he wanted me to get a job there and he thought French is the language of diplomacy. I was not interested in that, of course. But at least, thanks to my dad's silly ambitions, I grew up practically billingual.]