How to say “thanks” in 37 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 Finnish, where kiitos is the 47th most used word.
- Afrikaans dankie #85
- Albanian falë thanks to, owing to #776
- Arabic شكرا #100
- Armenian շնորհակալություն thank you, thanks #293
- Basque esker thanks to, owing to #81
- Bosnian zahvaljujući thanks to #1,540
- Bulgarian благодаря thanks, thank you #69
- Chinese 謝謝 thanks; thank you #178
- Croatian zahvaljujući thanks to #1,485
- Czech díky thanks to #108
- Danish takker #2,078
- Dutch dank gratitude, thanks #164
- Estonian tänan thank you, thanks #101
- Finnish kiitos thanks to #47
- Georgian მადლობა #147
- German danke thanks, gratitude, appreciation #98
- Greek ευχαριστώ thank you!, thanks! #75
- Hebrew בזכות thanks to #1,711
- Hindi धन्यवाद thanks, thank you #143
- Hungarian kösz #313
- Icelandic takk thank you, thanks #73
- Indonesian makasih #1,694
- Korean 고마워 #131
- Macedonian благодарам #102
- Persian مرسی #1,109
- Polish dzięki thanks to #113
- Portuguese obrigado thanks; thank you #118
- Romanian mersi #520
- Russian спасибо thank you, thanks #64
- Serbian zahvaljujući thanks to #1,367
- Slovak ďakujem thanks, thank you #76
- Swedish tack thanks, thank you #76
- Tamil நன்றி thanks, thank you #49
- Turkish sayesinde thanks to, with the help of, because of #1,020
- Ukrainian спасибі thank you, thanks #464
- Urdu شکریہ thanks, thank you #93
- Vietnamese nhờ thanks to; owing to #748
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.