Learning a few everyday phrases is the best way to start your journey with the Afrikaans language.

You can navigate almost any basic social situation in South Africa or Namibia just by knowing how to greet people properly.

Afrikaans is a phonetic and straightforward language, which makes these beginner phrases very easy to pick up.

This guide will walk you through the most essential Afrikaans greetings, polite expressions, and farewells.

Basic Afrikaans greetings

The easiest and most common way to greet someone in Afrikaans is simply by saying hallo.

It’s pronounced exactly like the English word “hello”.

You can use hallo in both formal and informal situations.

If you want to be more specific about the time of day, Afrikaans has specific greetings for morning, afternoon, and evening.

Notice how all these phrases start with goeie, which is the Afrikaans word for “good”.

Asking how someone is doing

After saying hello, it’s polite to ask the other person how they’re doing.

The standard phrase for this is hoe gaan dit.

This translates literally to “how goes it” in English.

You can use this phrase safely with friends, family, or complete strangers.

When someone asks you this question, you also need to know how to reply.

The most common response is goed, dankie, which means “good, thank you”.

Being polite in Afrikaans

Good manners are highly valued in South African culture.

You’ll definitely need to know how to say please and thank you.

The Afrikaans word for please is asseblief.

You’ll hear this word constantly in shops, restaurants, and daily conversations.

The word for thank you is dankie.

If you want to say “thank you very much”, you can simply say baie dankie.

Another helpful polite phrase is verskoon my, which means “excuse me”.

You can use this when trying to get past someone or to politely get a waiter’s attention.

Saying yes, no, and goodbye

You can’t have a basic conversation without knowing how to agree or disagree.

The Afrikaans word for yes is ja.

It’s pronounced very similarly to the English word “yah”.

The word for no is nee.

When it’s time to leave, the most common way to say goodbye is totsiens.

This word literally translates to “until seeing again”.

Locals also love to wish each other a good day when parting ways.

Summary table of essential phrases

Here’s a quick reference table of all the basic Afrikaans phrases we covered today.

Practicing these few words will make a massive difference in how native speakers respond to you.

If you want to keep improving your language skills, sign up for Talk In Afrikaans.

You’ll easily learn everything from conversational phrases to essential grammar in no time.