How to say “excellent” in 39 languages
Every one of these is a word that turns up in ordinary speech, not a dictionary curiosity — the number beside it is where it ranks in that language.
It is commonest in Korean, where 좋아 is the 47th most used word.
- Albanian shkëlqyeshëm excellent, brilliant #663
- Arabic جيد of good quality, excellent, approvable #73
- Armenian գերազանց #1,628
- Bengali সেরা best, excellent #389
- Bosnian odličan excellent, great #1,214
- Chinese 好棒 excellent!; superb!; bravo! #2,083
- Croatian odličan excellent, great #1,176
- Czech vynikající #1,858
- Danish fremragende #1,819
- Dutch uitstekend outstanding, excellent #1,755
- English fantastic Wonderful; marvelous; excellent;… #1,505
- Estonian suurepärane excellent, great, magnificent,… #337
- Finnish täydellinen perfect improved; excellent and delightful in… #957
- French terrible great, excellent #1,122
- Georgian შესანიშნავი excellent, remarkable, great #672
- Greek υπέροχο excellent, exquisite, marvellous, superb,… #657
- Hebrew מעולה excellent, terrific, wonderful, great, superb #463
- Hindi कमाल great, wonderful, excellent #1,340
- Hungarian kiváló eminent, excellent, outstanding #1,570
- Icelandic frábær excellent, brilliant, super, awesome, great #355
- Italian ottimo very good, very fine, excellent, perfect,… #646
- Korean 좋아 to be good; great; excellent #47
- Latvian lieliski great, wonderful, excellent, wonderfully,… #149
- Lithuanian puikus excellent, wonderful #384
- Macedonian одличен great, excellent, outstanding #690
- Malay elok good, fine, excellent #1,213
- Malayalam ഗംഭീരം excellent, great, awesome #486
- Norwegian utmerket excellent, splendid, outstanding #1,456
- Persian سارا pure; fine; excellent #651
- Polish wspaniałe magnificent, excellent #1,219
- Portuguese excelente #908
- Romanian excelent #1,235
- Serbian odličan excellent, great #1,036
- Slovenian odličen #457
- Spanish excelente excellent, brilliant, superb #1,113
- Swedish jättebra very well, fantastically, excellent #916
- Tamil சூப்பர் excellent, great, fantastic #689
- Ukrainian чудовий wonderful, marvellous, excellent, great #903
- Urdu شاندار magnificent, excellent #931
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.