Greetings in Spanish

You’ll learn how to say hello and goodbye at different times of day, and ask people how they are and what they’ve been up to. Just as importantly, you’ll practice some ways to reply when people ask you!

Listen carefully to the audio, and the way the native Spanish speakers pronounce each Spanish word or phrase. Practice these aloud until you feel confident, and then try them out on your friends!

Resources for further reading:

• Find out how to pronounce Spanish words properly
• How long does it take to become fluent in Spanish?

How to pronounce greetings in Spanish

Here are some of the most basic Spanish greetings to get you started. Further on in this lesson we will look at the pronunciation of these and more Spanish greetings.

• buenos días - good morning
• adiós - goodbye
• buenas tardes - good afternoon
• buenas noches - good evening
• muy buenos - a shortened version of the above three greetings, suitable anytime
• hola - hello
• ¿Cómo estás? - How are you? (used with friends or family)
• ¿Cómo está usted? - How are you? (more formal; used with strangers, more senior persons, etc.)
• ¿Cómo te va? - How’s it going?
• ¿Cómo has ido? - How’ve you been?

Greetings in Spanish

Greetings like “good morning” or “good afternoon” are incredibly important in Spanish. As Latin American culture is more formal, going through the ritual of greeting another person is an important way of showing respect.

In fact, in some parts of Latin America, you are expected to greet every person individually, even if they’re in a group. That means that if you’re walking along the road in a village and pass a group of five people, you’ll have to say, “Good morning,” five times!

After you greet someone, you’ll want to ask how they are or how’s it going. Here are some common questions that follow a greeting:

What could you say if someone asks you one of the questions above?

A common follow-up question is, “And you?” - **¿Y tú? **

Now, listen to Esteban and Estela’s conversation.

Did you understand most of what they said?

Here’s another conversation. This one is much more casual. You’re likely to hear this kind of conversation among young people.

Two new phrases in the above conversation are lo siento and sí.

The above words are extremely important. From experience, I know that the most important phrase in any language is how to say you’re sorry!

Others disagree. They say that there are THREE important phrases that you absolutely must know in any language. They are:

Hmm, I can’t think of a situation in which I’d need to use all three, but I’ll leave it to your imagination!

You can say goodbye with one of the following phrases.

That’s it for this lesson.

Learn more Spanish salutations here! Here are some recommended lessons:

• Find out words for the different ways to say Good Morning in Spanish with this free lesson.
• In this lesson we’ll cover several common ways to say goodbye when talking to Spanish people.

See you soon! ¡Hasta pronto!

Mauricio Evlampieff: Rocket Spanish