"Hello" in French - "Goodbye" in French
How many ways can you say "hello" in French? After this free French lesson for beginners you’ll know more than just a simple bonjour!
Listen to the audio and follow the French pronunciation. And don't be shy - go ahead and practice each French word aloud! Once you’re feeling confident with French greetings we’ll cover several ways to say "goodbye" in French as well.
Greetings like “good morning” or “good afternoon” are incredibly important in French. As the French culture is more formal, going through the ritual of greeting another person is an important way of showing respect. The French shake hands while saying “Bonjour” or “Bonsoir” depending on the time of the day. 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 and pass a group of five people, you’ll have to say, “Bonjour,” and shake hands five times!
Once you know them, you may kiss them on the cheeks. It is usually on both cheeks but in some regions it is up to four times so keep an eye of how many times people kiss on the cheeks.
How to pronounce Bonjour
As you have learned before, there are two ways of addressing someone in French: a polite or formal way using “Vous” and a more casual way using “Tu”. The same concept applies to greetings. Listen to the link below to hear formal French greetings…
As you can see there is no distinction in French between 'good morning' and 'good afternoon', only once it’s dark you will have to greet saying 'good evening'. Nowadays it is quite common to use English greetings, like “hi” and “bye bye”, but these are considered to be casual. Listen to the link below to hear some informal French greetings…
Saying hello in French
Saying good-bye in French
And here is a formal way of saying good-bye.
Let’s listen to some casual farewells…
That’s it for today’s lesson. Using different greetings will make you sound more fluent, so try to remember as many as you can.
À bientôt!
Marie-Claire Rivière and the Rocket French Team
