Hello, Thank You, Yes, Please: Basic Words in 30+ Languages

Hello is hola in Spanish, привет in Russian, 你好 in Chinese and merhaba in Turkish. Thank you is merci in French, спасибо in Russian and 감사합니다 in Korean, and please is bitte in German and lütfen in Turkish. Below are the survival words, the ones you need on day one, in more than 30 languages and a dozen scripts.

Every word here comes from real usage data, not from a phrasebook, and each section links to the full page on our free Say it in any language tool.

#Where these words come from

Each /tools/say page lists an English word in up to 53 languages. The words are ranked by how often they appear in film and TV subtitles (the OpenSubtitles 2018 frequency lists) and matched to English through Wiktionary. So these are words people actually say out loud, and every page shows where the word ranks in its language.

A few things to know before you read the tables:

• The lists count single words. A two-word phrase like “good night” can’t appear as one entry, so some languages are missing from some tables.
• Every row has an English meaning. We only print rows whose meaning matches the sense of the section. When a page matched “thanks” to “thanks to”, or “please” to “to please”, we left that row out.
• The lists are lowercase. We capitalize German nouns (Nacht, Wasser) the way you’d see them in a sentence. The Chinese entries in this data are written in traditional characters.

#Hello in different languages

你好 is the 40th most used word in Chinese. Hindi and Malayalam borrow the English word outright: हेलो and ഹലോ, and in Malayalam it ranks #62.

See “hello” in all 46 languages →

#Hi in different languages

Finnish hei is the 48th most used word in Finnish. Basque kaixo ranks even higher, at #45, and covers both hello and hi.

See “hi” in all 34 languages →

#Goodbye in different languages

Several of these carry their own picture: the data glosses Persian خداحافظ as “goodbye, God be with you”, and Chinese 再見, Hebrew להתראות and Hungarian viszlát as “see you later”. Goodbye is said far less than hello; it is most common in Basque, where agur ranks #140.

See “goodbye” in all 38 languages →

#Thank you in different languages

This table combines the “thank” and “thanks” pages. Thank you is one of the most spoken words anywhere: Malayalam നന്ദി ranks #35, Telugu ధన్యవాదాలు #46 and Tamil நன்றி #49. On the full pages, check the meaning column: several rows are glossed “thanks to” (as in “because of”) or “to thank”, which is not what you say to a waiter.

See “thank” in all 43 languages → · See “thanks” in all 37 languages →

#Please in different languages

Turkish lütfen is the 60th most used word in Turkish. Spanish has no row at all, and the Portuguese row is only favor. That fits the single-word rule above: when please is a two-word phrase, a word count can’t hold it whole.

See “please” in all 39 languages →

#Yes in different languages

Yes is near the very top of almost every list. Macedonian да is the most used word in the whole Macedonian list, Slovenian da ranks #3 and Albanian po #9. Greek is the one to watch: ναι means yes, even though it sounds like “nay”.

Why no “no” table? The tool doesn’t have a page for “no” yet, and we would rather leave it out than print translations the data doesn’t back.

See “yes” in all 45 languages →

#Sorry in different languages

Chinese 抱歉 ranks #41. Some languages simply borrow the English: German’s match is sorry and Malayalam’s is സോറി.

See “sorry” in all 37 languages →

#Excuse me in different languages

Every row here is glossed “excuse me” (the Italian one comes from the “pardon” page). The data glosses Armenian ներողություն as “excuse me” with the literal meaning “forgiveness”, and Czech promiň and Georgian უკაცრავად also as “sorry”. Many rows on the “excuse” page are the noun (“a pretext”) or the verb, so read its meaning column closely.

See “excuse” in all 35 languages → · See “pardon” in all 34 languages →

#Welcome in different languages

Arabic مرحبا is also the Arabic word on the hello page, glossed “hello, welcome”, and ranks #101. The Korean row on the full page is 천만에요, “you’re welcome!”, the reply to a thank you rather than a greeting at the door.

See “welcome” in all 35 languages →

#Good in different languages

The good page has a row for all 53 languages, and the word ranks #20 in Basque (ondo) and #25 in Malayalam (നല്ല). This is the page to read most carefully, though: several rows are really “better” or “good morning”, so use the meaning column.

See “good” in all 53 languages →

#Morning and good morning in different languages

Most languages need two words for “good morning”, but a few fold it into one, and those one-word greetings are what the data picked up. Many other rows on the page mean “in the morning”.

See “morning” in all 45 languages →

#Night in different languages

Chinese 晚上 is glossed “evening; night” and ranks #95. The night page covers all 53 languages, but skip the Korean row on the full page: its match is an error in the source data, even though the page reports it as the most common.

See “night” in all 53 languages → · See “evening” in all 44 languages →

#Friend in different languages

Chinese 朋友 is the 26th most used word in Chinese. For more people words, see family words in different languages.

See “friend” in all 52 languages →

#Water in different languages

Hindi पानी and Bengali পানি are the same word in two scripts. Water is most common in Tagalog, where tubig ranks #139.

See “water” in all 53 languages →

#Help in different languages

Turkish yardım ranks #89, and Persian کمک and Urdu مدد both rank #92. Some rows are the noun (help) and some the verb (to help); German helfen and Russian помочь are verbs.

See “help” in all 52 languages →

#Why a word list is not a phrasebook

Knowing danke or 감사합니다 gets you surprisingly far. But a single word leaves out the parts that make it polite or natural.

• Politeness has levels. Korean 감사합니다 is glossed simply “thank you”, while the thanks page matches 고마워, a more casual form. Turkish affedersiniz and Ukrainian вибачте are polite forms you’d use with a stranger. One English word often splits into a formal and a casual version, and a list can only show one.
• Context changes the word. “Excuse me” to get past someone, to get a waiter’s attention and to apologize can be three different words. The same goes for “please” when you’re asking for something versus begging.
• Some words only live in phrases. Spanish please, “good night” and “you’re welcome” are usually two or more words, so a single-word list shows fragments or nothing.

The fix is to hear the words in real conversation. Our guide to how to do a language exchange covers how to structure a session so both people practice, and greetings, thanks and small apologies come up in almost every one of the language exchange conversation topics we suggest.

If you want to go beyond survival words, the most common words lists show the top words in each language, and how many words you need to be fluent puts those lists in context. If your language uses another script, the alphabet pages show every letter.

#Practice them with a native speaker

On LangX, you’re matched with people who speak the language you’re learning and are learning yours. Open a conversation with a hello, and when you get a word or a form of politeness wrong, your partner can hold your message to correct it. Corrections are unlimited on every plan. If a word stumps you, translation is built into the chat. The free plan gives you five new conversations a day, with replies unlimited. You can get the app here, or read how to find a language exchange partner first.

#FAQ

#How do you say “hello” in different languages?

Spanish hola, Italian ciao, Portuguese olá, Russian привет, Greek γεια, Persian سلام, Turkish merhaba and Chinese 你好. The hello page has 46 languages.

#How do you say “thank you” in different languages?

French merci, German danke, Portuguese obrigado, Russian спасибо, Polish dziękuję, Hindi धन्यवाद, Korean 감사합니다 and Tagalog salamat. See the thank and thanks pages for more.

#Which basic word is the most common across languages?

In this data, yes. It is the single most used word in Macedonian (да) and in the top 20 for many others, including Albanian, Slovenian, Hebrew, Turkish and Telugu.

#Why are some languages missing from a table?

We only include rows whose English meaning matches the word in the section. If a language’s closest match on the page was a different sense, or the word is normally a phrase, we left it out rather than fill the gap from memory.