Hello in Japanese: 11 Greetings and When to Use Each

Almost every guide answers "how do you say hello in Japanese" with one word: こんにちは. That is not wrong, but it will make you sound strange within about a day of arriving, because it quietly assumes Japanese works like English. It does not.

Japanese has no single all-purpose greeting. English "hello" works at 6am and 11pm, on the phone, to your boss and to your flatmate. Japanese splits that job across different words depending on the time of day, whether you are arriving or leaving, whether you are inside your own household, and how well you know the person. Say こんにちは to your own family walking into the kitchen and it lands somewhere between odd and sarcastic, a bit like announcing "good afternoon" to your brother.

So the useful answer is not one word. It is a small set, with the situations attached.

Table of Contents

• The short answer
• おはようございます (ohayou gozaimasu)
• こんにちは (konnichiwa)
• こんばんは (konbanwa)
• もしもし (moshi moshi)
• はじめまして (hajimemashite)
• おつかれさま (otsukaresama)
• ただいま and おかえり (tadaima, okaeri)
• いらっしゃいませ (irasshaimase)
• ひさしぶり (hisashiburi)
• やあ and おっす (yaa, ossu)
• The mistakes learners actually make
• What to learn first

The short answer

If you want one line to memorise before a trip:

The rest of this article is when each one applies, and the cases where the obvious choice is the wrong one.

Ohayou gozaimasu

おはようございます is the morning greeting.

Use it from when you wake until roughly 10 or 11am. There is no hard cutoff and nobody will correct you at 10:30.

The casual form is おはよう on its own, for family, close friends and people clearly below you in a hierarchy. Adding ございます is what makes it polite, and it is the safer default with anyone you do not know well.

One quirk worth knowing: in many workplaces, especially broadcasting, hospitality and entertainment, おはようございます is used whenever your shift starts, even at 8pm. It has drifted from "good morning" toward "I have arrived at work." If someone greets you with it at night, they are not confused.

Konnichiwa

こんにちは is the one everybody learns, and it is genuinely the right word from late morning until dark. It is polite, neutral, and safe with strangers.

Two things people get wrong.

It is written with は, not わ. The character is the topic particle, because the phrase is a shortening of an older sentence along the lines of "as for today...". It is pronounced wa. This trips up learners who know their kana but not the particle, and it is a good reason to keep the hiragana and katakana quiz handy.

You do not use it inside your own household. こんにちは carries a small distance with it, the kind you keep with neighbours, shopkeepers and colleagues. Family members do not greet each other with it. If you come home you say ただいま instead, which is further down.

Konbanwa

こんばんは covers the evening, from around sunset onwards. Same structure as こんにちは, same は spelling, same neutral politeness.

It is a greeting for meeting someone, not for parting. If you are leaving for the night you want おやすみなさい (oyasumi nasai, good night) or さようなら, not こんばんは.

Moshi moshi

もしもし is a phone greeting and effectively nothing else. Say it to someone standing in front of you and it sounds like a joke, roughly the effect of answering your friend in person with "hello, who's calling?"

It is also casual. In business you do not answer もしもし, you answer with your company or your name: 「はい、田中です」. Learners who picked it up from anime often use it in exactly the situation where it is wrong.

There is more on words like this, that arrive through anime with the wrong shading attached, in Japanese words everyone gets wrong.

Hajimemashite

はじめまして is what you say the first time you meet someone, and only the first time. It sits at the front of a self-introduction:

はじめまして、田中たなかです。よろしくお願ねがいします。
Nice to meet you, I'm Tanaka. Please treat me well.

Pairing it with よろしくお願いします is close to automatic. If you learn one full sentence before a trip, learn that one.

Otsukaresama

おつかれさまです is the greeting almost no beginner course teaches and every learner in Japan ends up needing.

It has no clean English equivalent. Literally it acknowledges that the other person is tired from working. In practice it is the all-purpose workplace hello, goodbye, thank you and acknowledgement, used between colleagues at any hour. You say it passing someone in a corridor, joining a meeting, and leaving for the day.

If you work in Japan you will say this more than every other greeting on this list combined. The casual form between equals is おつかれ.

Tadaima and okaeri

These are the household pair, and they are the reason こんにちは feels wrong at home.

• ただいま is said by the person arriving home. It is short for a phrase meaning "I have just this moment returned."
• おかえり (or おかえりなさい, politer) is the reply from whoever is already there. It means "welcome back."

The exchange is close to obligatory in Japanese homes. It also extends slightly beyond the house: returning to your desk after being out, some people will use it with colleagues.

Irasshaimase

いらっしゃいませ is what shop and restaurant staff shout when you walk in. It means something like "welcome, please come in."

The important part for a visitor: you do not reply to it. It is not directed at you as a conversation opener, it is closer to a door chime. A small nod is more than enough. Learners who carefully answer it are doing something no Japanese customer does.

Hisashiburi

ひさしぶり is "long time no see." Politer: おひさしぶりです.

It is not a standalone greeting so much as an addition to one. You still open with こんにちは or the person's name, then add it:

こんにちは、おひさしぶりです。
Hello, it's been a while.

Roughly, use it when you have not seen someone for a few weeks or more.

Yaa and ossu

For completeness, the very casual end:

• やあ or よう is a light "hey," between friends.
• おっす is much more casual again, strongly associated with young men, sports clubs and martial arts. It carries a blunt, matey tone.

Use these only with people you would already speak casually to. With anyone else they read as rude rather than friendly, and the cost of being too formal in Japanese is much lower than the cost of being too casual.

The mistakes learners actually make

• Using こんにちは as an all-day hello. It is daytime only, and it is not for your own family.
• Writing こんにちわ. It is spelled with は even though it sounds like wa.
• Saying もしもし in person. Phone only, and casual even then.
• Replying to いらっしゃいませ. Nod and carry on.
• Repeating はじめまして. It is strictly for a first meeting.
• Defaulting to casual forms. おはよう instead of おはようございます with a stranger sounds abrupt. When unsure, take the longer, politer form.
• Skipping the bow. A small nod accompanies most of these. The words alone can feel oddly flat.

What to learn first

If you are starting today, in this order:

1. おはようございます、こんにちは、こんばんは. The time-of-day trio covers almost every situation with a stranger.
2. はじめまして、よろしくお願いします. One sentence, used every time you meet anyone new.
3. ただいま and おかえり, if you will be living with anyone.
4. おつかれさまです, the moment you set foot in a workplace.

Everything else on this list you will pick up by hearing it.

Since most of these are written in kana, the fastest way to make them stick is to be able to read them rather than memorise romaji. The hiragana and katakana quiz covers the characters, and the greetings lesson puts them together with the writing system. From there, 10 useful Japanese phrases for beginners adds the phrases that come immediately after a greeting, and how to say excuse me in Japanese covers すみません, which you will use even more often than こんにちは.

If you want to see any of these inside a full sentence, paste it into the Japanese sentence analyzer and it will break the greeting, the particle and the verb apart for you.