Bonjour means hello in French.

You may have already known this! That's a good start then.

If you break the word down, you will get "bon" which means "good" and "jour" which means "day."​

You can use bonjour when you meet someone during the morning or the daylight hours. It is weird, however, to say bonjour during the evening! Anywhere after 6PM (18h00)  you should be saying "bonsoir."

Bonsoir means "good evening" in French. This word could mean both hello or goodbye! If you're leaving someone and you use this, it sort of says "have a good evening."

If you say "bonjour" to someone when it's already late in the day, people will reply "bonsoir" - making you look weird.

Bon après-midi means "good afternoon." You can say it when you say goodbye in the afternoon. I don't hear this one too often in France because these greetings overlap. People usually opt for bonjour or bonsoir. The window to use bon après-midi would be anywhere from noon until 4-5PM.

Bonne nuit is "good night." It's what the French say before going to bed.

Au revoir means "Goodbye" in French. It's a generic, formal French phrase that you'll use a lot.

So how is this all relevant in the real world?

You wake up and go run some errands before work. You stop by the local bakery and give the boulanger a hearty "bonjour !" to which he will respond. When you leave, you tell him to have a great day (passez une bonne journée). You make your way to work and greet your co-workers with bonjour / salut depending on your relationship with them. When the evening arrives you are ready to leave work. You tell people "bonsoir !"which is sort of like saying "have a great rest of your day."

HOW ARE YOU? 

Asking the generic "how are you?" in French is a bit different than in English. In French, we use an idiomatic phrase! 

Rather than say "how are you," we say "how is it going?"

If you're talking to a friend or someone you know well, then you can say ça va or ça va bien ? These are very informal.

You can also say tu vas bien ? which loosely translates to "you're doing well?"​

The most formal way to ask this question would be comment allez-vous ? A somewhat formal way to greet a friend would be comment vas-tu ?

All these variations are just different ways on how to ask simple questions in French.

So how would you answer this question if someone asked you it?

The easiest way is actually just to respond "ça va" which means fine!! 

You could also respond "tout va bien" (all is well) or "je vais bien" (I'm doing fine).​

And one word answers are acceptable too:

Conversations between friends wind up looking something like this:

PLEASE & THANK YOU

It's important not to forget saying please and thank you in French!

In a formal context, please translates to s'il vous plaît (or SVP in writing). Amongst friends you would say s'il te plaît (or STP in writing).

If you are really thankful you can say "thanks alot" or merci beaucoup. Otherwise, saying merci means "thank you."

To respond to friends you would say de rien (duh ree-n), which means you're welcome. To respond more formally you would say je vous en prie.

WHAT'S YOUR NAME?

This is an important beginner phrase when you meet new people. Knowing someone's name is valuable and can help break the ice.

In an informal context you can use any of these phrases:

Comment est-ce que tu t'appelles ?

Tu t'appelles comment ?

Comment t'appelles-tu ?

In a formal context or when talking to multiple people, aim for this:

Vous vous appelez comment ?

Comment vous vous appelez ?

PARDON ME - EXCUSE ME? - SORRY

If you bump into somebody by accident on the metro, what would you say in English?

Because in French, we would mostly say "pardon." We could also use this word when navigating through a large crowd.

When speaking and you need to cut somebody off, politely, we opt for excusez-moi. You can also use excusez-moi as a formal way to get somebody's attention.

If you didn't hear what someone said and would like them to repeat something then you can say "pardon ?" Although you do have other options. Some people use "hein?" or "comment ?" when they didn't hear what you said. This is similar to saying "huh?" in English. So don't feel as though you are stuck saying "pardon" all the time.

Now if you want to express that you're sorry you can use the word "désolé."

Saying "je suis désolé(e)" is a stronger form of both pardon/excusez-moi. It's used to empathize with people or to get them through a bad situation.

If you just walked up to your bank teller and asked him to do something - but he can't - he'll tell you "je suis désolé monsieur, mais..."

If you are a female, you need to add an extra "e" to the end of désolé because it's an adjective that needs to agree. So you would say "je suis désolée."

You can also say "je suis vraiment désolé" to mean that you are really sorry.

Great - so now we know how to introduce ourselves in French. We can ask someone's name and even see how they are doing. These are all essentials in conversations!

With all these words you can start learning how to hold a conversation in French.

Or you can check out all of our articles on how to learn French.