How do you say Hello in Russian: 3 different ways

Hi everyone! Today I am going to teach you how to know another person’s attitude towards you depending on how he says ‘Hello’ in Russian. First of all, the most common way to say ‘Hello’ in the Russian language is «Привет». You can say it to members of your family, to work colleagues, friends, classmates and so on. Avoid saying «Привет» to strangers in the street!

It is such a common greeting that touters use it in other countries to try to attract Russian tourists. Russians ignore it of course!

So how do you say Hello in Russian? There are three main ways of how to pronounce the Russian word for ‘Hello’ — «Привет».

1. Pronounce the letter ‘e’ (ПривЕт) as a really long sound. It’s like «Приве-е-е-ет!» When you pronounce ‘Hello’ in Russian this way, it means that you are very happy to see someone and you like them very much.

2. The most common way to pronounce ‘Hello’ in Russian. All letters in the word «Привет» are pronounced neither long nor short. It’s a usual way to greet people in Russia and doesn’t have any contextual meaning. But what it does NOT mean is that you don’t like this person. Because…

This smiling guy says «Привет» with a long ‘е’ because he is very happy to meet you on this website!

3. …when you don’t really like someone or are not really happy to see them, you would pronounce «Привет» in a fast, flat and toneless way! More than that, this way of saying ‘Hello’ in Russian doesn’t imply smiling 🙂

So there we go! Now you know if Russian folks are happy to see you depending on how they pronounce the greeting word «Привет»!

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