Many rural areas in France have been repopulated since the 1970s. Through our current PhD research, we conduct a deeper understanding of its geographical and sociological features. As part of this paper, we examine population dynamics and migration flows to French rural areas, in a national perspective and a quantitative biographical approach. Because of census population data does partially interrogate the importance of life course processes, we mainly use data extracted from the Histoire de Vie national survey, to study hundreds of residential trajectories towards rural areas. First of all, we demonstrate the diversity of demographic profiles implicated, by means of classical criteria (age, income, socio-professional category, family structure) and biographical indicators (about birthplace, number of residential steps, some previous links with rural life). Then, we comment some charts and mappings to investigate residential histories. The aim is also to propose some pathways to develop different inputs of a biographical approach in population geography, between quantitative and qualitative methods.