Chinese Language Blog

A few days ago, we introduced a bunch of different ways to say “Hello” in Chinese. Naturally, today we’re going to look at a few different words that can be used to say “Goodbye.”

A simple video on how to say goodbye in Chinese.

Here are ten Chinese goodbyes, with English, Chinese characters, and pinyin transliteration:

Here are some tips for using these:

• The most common way to say goodbye in Chinese is definitely 再见.
• 拜拜 is a casual goodbye that is usually used with friends/on the phone. It’s definitely a Chinese version of the English “Bye bye.”
• If you plan on seeing someone again soon, you can use both 回头见 and 一会儿见.
• I often use 下次见 with my students. Since we just see each other at class time, saying “See you next time” is a good way to say goodbye.
• You’ll often hear 慢走 when leaving a restaurant. It makes sense, seeing as how you’ll already be walking slow thanks to all the food you ate and beer you drank.
• Both 一路平安 and 一路顺风 are ways to say goodbye to someone when they’re going away on a vacation or something. I expect to hear this a lot this fall when I head out of Beijing to travel SE Asia for a few months.

In case you missed it, this is a video I made about Chinese Greetings.

Well there you go… you’re now equipped with over 25 ways to say “Hello” and “Goodbye” in Chinese. You should be able to greet any person in any situation once you’ve got all those down. Don’t forget you can always learn a new Chinese word every day with us!

When learning a language, chances are the first word you will learn is the equivalent of “Hello.” After all, you can’t really start talking to someone before greeting them! Just like in English, where we have a ton of ways to greet someone (Hello, Hi, Hey, What’s up?, How are you?, etc.), there are plenty of options in Chinese as well.

The most common way to say "Hello" in Chinese.

Here are 15 different ways to greet someone in Mandarin Chinese, in an easy-to-follow table with English, Chinese characters, and pinyin transliteration:

A nice and easy YouTube video about saying “Hello” in Chinese.

Ok… do you have those 15 expressions down? Test yourself by choosing the proper greeting for the following situations:

• You greet someone after dinner, at around 7 PM.
• You greet your Chinese teacher before class.
• You see an old friend for the first time in a long time.
• You greet an acquaintance who is your age.
• You greet a potential business partner for the first time.
• You answer your phone.
• You greet an elder.
• You greet someone after breakfast, at around 9 AM.
• You greet a good friend.
• You greet a large group of people.
• You greet someone after lunch, at around 1 PM.
• You greet two of your classmates who you are studying with.

Now that you know 15 common greetings, do your best to try and use them in the appropriate situations. Check back here in the near future for a post about how to say goodbye in Chinese.

Relationships are a crucial part of our daily life. Talking about the relationships you have with various people is an important part of studying any language. After all, you’ll often be asked the question, “Who is he/she?” when talking about other people. First of all, here’s how you can ask both of those questions in Chinese:

• Who is he? (他是谁？- tā shì shuí)

• Who is she? (她是谁？- tā shì shuí)

Notice that the pronunciation for “he” and “she” is the same in Chinese, but a different character is used. Of course, when talking about relationships, your family often comes up first. Luckily for you, I’ve already written a detailed post about how to talk about your family. Once you’ve read up on that, do your best to decipher the complicated Chinese family tree in this video:

It sure is complicated in Chinese…

Anyways, today I’m going to teach you some new words to use. When you answer that question, you’ll begin by saying:

• He’s my… (他是我的 – tā shì wǒ de)

• She’s my… (她是我的 – tā shì wǒ de)

Now to help you build up your vocabulary, here are 20 words for talking about relationships in Chinese:

Just use those words to complete the sentences above, and you can probably talk about most of the people you know in Chinese! Er… well… at least you can introduce them! Here are some examples of my own:

她是我的女朋友.

他是我的好朋友，也是我的室友.

他是我的同事.

Now you try! Use the new words from this lesson to practice introducing the various people in your life. In the meantime, keep building your vocabulary by learning a new Chinese word every day.