Greetings in Spanish: How to Start a Conversation
How do you greet a person in Spanish? As it happens in all the languages, there are many ways of doing it. For example, you can just say “Hi!” or you can use the question “How are you doing?” Firstly, I present here some of the most common greetings and how we use them in a real conversation. At the end, you will find two exercises and the correct answers. Consequently, you will be able to check how much you have learnt.
Hola – Hello
¡Hola! Me llamo Pedro. ¿Cómo te llamas? – Hi! My name is Pedro. What is your name?
¡Hola! Me llamo Carmen.
Buenos días – Good morning
¡Buenos días! ¿Qué tal estás? – Good morning! How are you doing?
Buenas tardes – Good afternoon
¡Buenas tardes! ¿Cómo estás? – Good afternoon! How are you doing?
Buenas noches – Good night
¡Buenas noches! ¿Todo bien? – Good night! Is everthing ok?
If you would like to hear some greetings in Spanish, this is the episode of my podcast where I help you learn how to say hello to another person:
After you have heard the episode, listen again, and say the greetings with me. In addition to that, you can take part on the dialogs and translate the sentences.
Greetings in Conversations
Above all we must remember that vocabulary and grammar points must be learned in context. Therefore, now we will see some short conversations.
After all, we usually say something more than “Hi!” or “Good afternoon!” when we meet people.
– Yo soy María.
– Encantado.
Encantado significa Nice to meet you.
– Hola, Carlos, ¿cómo estás?
– Muy bien, muchas gracias. ¿Y tú?
– Yo estoy bien también.
– Buenos días, Carmen. ¿Qué tal estás?
– Estoy bien, ¿y tú?
– Muy bien.
Exercises on Greetings in Spanish
We are going to translate now a conversation from English into Spanish. After that, you can check with my version in Spanish at the end of this article.
– Hi! How are you doing?
– I am fine. And you?
– I am doing very well. I am sorry. Your name is…?
– My name is Pedro. What is your name?
– My name is Clara. Nice to meet you, Pedro.
– Nice to meet you, Clara.
In addition to translations, fill-in-the-blanks exercises can be very helpful to review the vocabulary.
For instance, you have here a short conversation where some words are missing. As it happened with the previous exercise, at the bottom of this article you can find the correct answers.
– Buenos ____________________. ¿Cómo te ____________________?
– Hola. Buenos ____________________. Me ____________________ Verónica.
– ____________________, Verónica. Yo ____________________ llamo Leonardo.
– ____________________, Leonardo.
– Tengo que irme. (I have to go). ¡ ____________________ mañana, Verónica!
– ¡____________________, Leonardo!
Correct answers
You have done both exercises and consequently you would like to know whether your answers are correct or not. However, if you have made some mistakes, review the vocabulary, let some hours or days go by, and try again.
If you would like to have more documents with exercises, please check my Spanish for Beginners page.
Conversación:
– Hi! How are you doing? ¡Hola! ¿Cómo estás?
– I am fine. And you? Estoy bien. ¿Y tú?
– I am doing very well. I am sorry. Your name is…? Estoy muy bien. Lo siento. ¿Te llamas…?
– My name is Pedro. What is your name? Me llamo Pedro. ¿Cómo te llamas?
– My name is Clara. Nice to meet you, Pedro. Me llamo Clara. Encantada, Pedro.
– Nice to meet you, Clara. Encantado, Clara.
Fill-in-the-blanks exercise:
– Buenos días. ¿Cómo te llamas?
– Hola. Buenos días. Me llamo Verónica.
– Encantado, Verónica. Yo me llamo Leonardo.
– Encantada, Leonardo.
– Tengo que irme. (I have to go). ¡Hasta mañana, Verónica!
– ¡Adiós / Hasta mañana / Hasta luego, Leonardo!
In conclusion, you will improve if you keep doing exercises and using the language. If you have any questions or comments, please send me an email: contacto.