How to say “luck” in 40 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 Afrikaans, where geluk is the 211th most used word.
- Afrikaans geluk luck, good luck #211
- Albanian fat #235
- Basque zorion good luck, luck, fortune #1,726
- Bengali ভাগ্য #439
- Bosnian sretno luckily, with luck, having luck, with the… #1,001
- Bulgarian късмет fortune, luck, kismet #500
- Catalan sort #332
- Chinese 非洲 of bad luck #847
- Croatian sretno luckily, with luck, having luck, with the… #738
- Danish held luck, fortune #580
- Dutch geluk luck, good luck #557
- English lucky Favoured by luck; fortunate; having good… #642
- Esperanto ŝancon #855
- Estonian õnn #804
- Finnish onnea good luck, best wishes #576
- French chance #261
- Galician fortuna luck, fortune #1,999
- Greek τύχη fate, chance, luck #540
- Hungarian szerencsét #1,064
- Icelandic heppni good luck, fortune #1,401
- Italian fortuna #577
- Korean 운 luck, fortune, fate #936
- Latvian nelaime misfortune, bad luck, ill-fortune #2,156
- Lithuanian nelaimė misfortune, bad luck #1,658
- Malay nasib fate, destiny, luck #654
- Malayalam ഭാഗ്യം #258
- Norwegian hell #2,183
- Persian شانسی random, by luck #1,771
- Polish powodzenia good luck #983
- Romanian noroc luck; good fortune #486
- Russian удачи good luck! #947
- Serbian sretno luckily, with luck, having luck, with the… #1,648
- Slovenian sreča #535
- Spanish suerte luck, fortune #334
- Tagalog suwerte luck; good luck #1,665
- Tamil சனி bad luck, disaster #740
- Telugu అదృష్టము fortune, luck, chance, fate #593
- Ukrainian удачі good luck! best of luck! #2,180
- Urdu بھاگ destiny, fortune, luck #730
- Vietnamese phúc good fortune; good luck; happiness; bliss;… #769
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.