How To Say Hello In Chinese Language

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One of the first things students learn when learning Chinese is how to greet people. They are always taught that to say “hello” in Chinese, you should say 你好 (? nĭhǎo).

How To Say Hello In Chinese Language

However, “Nĭhǎo” is only one of many different greetings used by Chinese speakers. In most cases, this is not the most common thing! Read on to discover the many different ways to say “hello” in Chinese.

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你好 or pīnyīn “nĭhǎo” is a greeting commonly taught in Chinese language textbooks for beginners. Made up of the characters “you” (你 nĭ) and “good” (好 hǎo), it literally means “you are good”. If you’re new to Chinese, you can’t go wrong using 你好 nĭhǎo for “Hello.” That’s why don’t worry if this is your only greeting for the first time.

If you pay attention to how the Chinese greet you, you don’t hear them say “你好”. Because 你好 is a formal greeting that sounds a little harsh to native speakers.

你好 is not usually used among friends. The most common situation where native Chinese speakers use this word is when meeting someone new.

If you introduce two people who are roughly the same age and see each other as equals, they might say “你好，你好” while shaking hands. If they already know each other, they are more likely to use a more informal greeting.

Ways To Say Hi In Chinese

你好 is also used as a greeting from a superior to a subordinate. However, keep in mind that it sounds too formal compared to many of the other common greetings presented below.

Knowing the different ways to say “hello” in Chinese will help you be prepared for any situation.

Many Chinese beginners probably know that the official way to say hello is 您好 (nínhǎo). If you are a beginner in Chinese, you may remember that 您好 is used to show respect by noticing that the only difference between 你 and 您 is that 您好 is used to show respect by the Chinese character for heart, 心 (xīn), under the 您 in 您好.

The best time to use this greeting is when meeting someone much older than you, a teacher, a supervisor, or someone important. It can be addressed to the person you want to honor for the first time. You can also use 您好 as a greeting in written formal correspondence.

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If you’re looking for a way to greet a group of people, you’ve found it in “大家好” (dàjiā hǎo).大家 means “everyone” or “all” in Chinese, so this greeting means “everyone is good.” .”

More accurately, it can be translated as “hello everyone”. This is a very nice greeting to the group.

If you read on, you’ll soon notice that many Chinese greetings can be created by adding 好 to other characters to represent the person or persons you want to address. It happens in 大家好.

Greetings are usually formed by adding 好 after the characters representing the time of day. An example of this is the phrase 下午好 (xiàwǔhǎo, or “Good day”) discussed below.

How To Say Hello In 30 Different Languages

If you are learning Chinese, consider greeting your teacher as 老师好 (lǎoshī hǎo). Literally translated, this phrase means “good teacher”, but it actually means “Hello, teacher”.

This greeting follows a pattern similar to 你好 (nĭhǎo) and 大家好 (dàjiā hǎo) above. To create this, first write the character of the person you want to speak to, in this case your teacher or 老师. Then add 好.

In the United States, teachers are addressed by a combination of first and last names, just like everyone else. But in China, it is customary to call teachers 老师. In general, most Chinese people greet their teachers as 老师好, even if they are not their teachers.

The Confucian tradition continues to have a great influence on modern Chinese society. As a result, education is considered very important and teachers are highly valued. Sometimes people show respect for non-teachers by calling them 老师!

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Another common pattern for creating a greeting is to enter the time of day you want to meet the person you wish to greet, followed by the word 好.

For example, if you are greeting someone in the afternoon, it would be 下午好 (xiàwǔhǎo) for 下午 in Mandarin.

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According to the above convention, if you meet someone at night, you can start the greeting with 晚业, the Chinese word for night, and add 好 to the end. This will change your greeting to 晚业好 (wǎnshànghǎo).

Be careful: the literal translation of this phrase is “good night,” and English speakers may reverse the order and assume that it’s actually a way of saying “good night.” However, this interpretation is incorrect. “Good night” in English is not a greeting. Rather, it is a way of saying goodbye to someone.

But in Chinese, 晚业好 (wǎnshànghǎo) means “good evening” and is a greeting and greeting.

If you want to greet someone in the morning, write the word morning with 早上 followed by 好. This forms the usual greeting 早上好 (zǎoshànghǎo; good morning). You can also say 早 (zǎo) which means good morning.

Ways To Say Hello In Chinese

While it is possible to simply say 早 in the morning, note that this shortening of the greeting is not appropriate in other situations. not acceptable. Only 早上好 can be shortened like this.

Both 早 and 早上好 are similar, but 早 is less formal. You can think of 早 (zǎo) as similar to the English “morning” greeting.早天好, on the other hand, means “good morning”.

早 can be used among friends and acquaintances, while 早上好 (zǎoshanghǎo) is more appropriate for older people, bosses, or people you just met.

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In English-speaking countries, phone greetings are often the same as those used in everyday life. In fact, most English speakers simply say “hello” on the phone.

But in China, it sounds strange to say 你好 (nĭhǎo) for your phone. But most people answer the phone with 喂 (wéi). Usually, they focus more on the character’s growing tone and say it as a one-word question.

You can add 你好 (nĭhǎo) if you want to be extra polite or if you suspect that there is an important caller on the other end of the line. However, saying 喂，你好 (wéi, nĭhǎo) sounds more natural than saying 你好 itself.

Note that many dictionaries have two different entries for 喂, one for rising tone (wéi) and one for falling tone (wèi). When pronounced with a falling tone, 喂 is sometimes used as an accent to get someone’s attention. However, this often occurs as a way to answer the phone. In that sense, it is pronounced with a rising tone.

Ways To Say Hello In Other Languages

The more ways you can say “hello” in Chinese, the more comfortable you will be in your daily interactions while living in China.

Chinese beginners are sometimes asked “你吃了吗?” (Nĭ chī le ma?) “Have you eaten?” is a common greeting in China.

However, this greeting is less common than you might think. Today, it’s somewhat outdated, and it’s more common to hear it from older people, especially those living in rural or small towns.

Young people are less likely to say hello. In fact, it sounds a bit odd to say that to anyone but the older generations of modern China.

How To Say Hello In Chinese

This greeting can be confusing because it sounds like a question that really needs an answer, a common American English greeting is “How are you?” Similar to 你吃了吗, but not an actual question that requires details. to answer.

As many people think, this greeting is not an invitation to a meal. It’s just a polite word. So, even if you haven’t eaten anything, “吃了，你呢?” is easier to answer. (Chī le, nĭ ne?), which means: “I ate, you?”

If you answer that you haven’t eaten anything, you will put the host in a difficult situation. Because they will feel compelled to invite you to dinner and expect you to politely decline the invitation.

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