Political histories of the Algerian Revolution (1954-62), the most emblematic war of decolonization, have focused on the armed and diplomatic struggle led by nationalist elites, and especially on the chiefs of the National Liberation Front (FLN). Combining oral history and archival research, this paper provides a contrasting approach by examining the experiences and perspectives of ordinary Algerians who participated in the revolution. It draws chiefly on interviews that the author conducted with 30 women and men who lived through the struggle in Algiers. These included former rank and file militants, shantytown dwellers, domestic workers, street kids, and farmers. Algerians’ political engagement during the revolution did not always take the form of open, violent rebellion against French colonialism. Over almost eight years, their daily struggle to survive consisted in quotidian acts of resistance (both open and covert), noncompliance, evasion, and collaboration with the French. Faced with reports of torture, assassinations, and massacres by the French army, Algerians had good reason to disguise their support for the revolution. The (often violent) pressures that the FLN placed on the population for its support, as well as the penury in which most Algerians lived, weighed heavily on people’s political calculations as well. A greater number of Algerians than is sometimes acknowledged decided that collaboration with the French was their best option given their circumstances. Many others aimed to maintain autonomy from both the French and the FLN; this autonomy was key to survival in a rapidly changing situation that demanded flexibility of response. The paper opens with a discussion of what James C. Scott would call the ‘infrapolitics’ of the revolution: Algerians’ intentionally low-profile and quotidian ways of resisting French domination without risking the danger of open defiance. Since Algerians also had to deal with the hegemonic pretensions of the FLN, the paper also examines how Algerians navigated their relationship of power with an organization that sought to discipline them. This leads to a discussion of two groups that complicated, in different ways, the categories of resistance and collaboration during the Algerian Revolution: the ‘harkis’ (Algerians who worked for the French during the war), and the French citizens who fought with the FLN. The paper demonstrates that the lines between collaboration and resistance are rarely black and white, and how Algerians in a position of weakness took advantage of this grey area to work situations to their least disadvantage.