Learn Japanese - Master MORE Basic Greetings in Japanese

Remember in our previous lesson, we learned こんにちは as a general greeting meaning "hi" or "hello".

In this lesson, we are going to learn more general greetings.

おはようございます こんばんは. and おやすみなさい

おはよう means "good morning". And おはようございます is a more polite way to say it,

because ございます increases the politeness level of the phrase.

As we learned, こんにちは is a general greeting that means "hi" or "hello". But it can also mean "good afternoon".

こんばんは means "good evening" and usually people use it after sunset.

おやすみなさい is usually used before going to bed.

This phrase comes from the verb やすむ which means "to take rest" or "to go to bed".

お is a prefix used to make a phrase polite.

So this literally means "please, go to bed" in a polite way.

So now, you learned all the basic greetings to use throughout the day. Let’s practice.

おはようございます。

こんにちは。

こんばんは。

おやすみなさい。

Now it’s time for Hiroko’s hint. When you want to say おはようございます or おやすみなさい to your friends or family, you can say おはよう or おやすみ