21 French Greetings For Beginners

In our last lesson, nous avons appris comment conjuguer les verbes avoir, être et aller. Today, we will learn 21 French greetings for beginners.

One of the first things we learn as children is how to greet and respond to greetings and this is because to develop social skills it is important to master the meet and greet.

So from hello and good morning to goodbye and see you soon, we will learn common French phrases that will help us communicate with family, friends and strangers.

Les Salutations

• How to say hello

Bonjour — Good morning. Unlike in English, bonjour can be used to say Hello in the morning and the afternoon if you are seeing a person for the first time that day. The general rule of thumb is, it is okay to say bonjour until it is officially evening. It is not common to hear a French speaker say Bon matin or Bon après-midi even though they are direct translations of good morning and good afternoon.

Bonsoir— Good evening

Salut — Hi

• How to ask how one is doing

Comment ça va?/Ça va? — How are you?

Comment vas-tu? — How are you? (Informal )

Comment allez-vous? — How are you (Formal/Respectful)

Quoi de neuf — What’s up? (Informal)

Ça bouge? — How is it going? (Informal)

In our last lesson, I explained that the reason it is important to be able to identify and conjugate les verbes avoir, être et aller is because it will appear in almost every French sentence you will ever make. Take another look at the French phrase for <<How are you>> and its responses and you will see conjugations of le verbe aller.

This is why it is important to learn French grammar and avoid direct word-for-word translation.

Quick Lesson: 

En français, quotation marks (” “) are replaced by these symbols (<< >>) called Les Guillemets.

• How to respond when asked how you are doing

Ça va bien, merci — I am fine, thank you.

Je vais bien, merci — I am fine, thank you.

Très bien, merci — Very well, thank you.

Rien de spécial – Nothing special, just the usual

Et tu/vous?  — And you?

• How to say goodbye

Au revoir — Goodbye

À bientôt — See you soon

À toute à l’heure — See you later

À la prochaine— See you next time

À demain— See you tomorrow

Bonne journée —  Have a good day.

Bonne soirée — Have a good evening.

Bonne nuit — Good night.

That’s it for 21 French greetings for beginners.

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