Useful Taiwanese phrases

A collection of useful phrases in Taiwanese. Click on the English phrases to see them in many other languages.

English 台語 (Taiwanese)
Welcome 歡迎光臨 (hoan-geng5 kong-lim5)
Hello 你好 (li2-ho2)
How are you?

I'm fine/not bad, thanks
你好嗎? (li2-ho2-bo0)
多謝, 我真好 (to-sia2, gua2 tsin5-ho/be7-bai2)
Pleased to meet you 我真歡喜及你認似 (Goa2 chin hoan-hi2 kap li2 sek8-sai7)
Good morning 爻早 (gau5-tsa2)
Good afternoon 午安 (go-on)
Good evening 晚安 (buan2-an)
Good night 晚安 (buan2-an)
Cheers/Good health! 呼乾啦! (Hō ta lah!) - lit. "Let it [the cup/glass] be dry [empty]"
I don't understand 我聽無 gua2 thian-bo0
Do you speak Taiwanese?

Yes, a little
你會曉講台語無? (Li2 e7-hiau2 kong2 tai5-gi2 bo5)
會曉, 一點點 (e7-hiau2, jit-tiam-tiam)
Excuse me 請問 (chhian2-mng7) 對不起 (tui3-put4-khi2)
借過 (tsioh4-kue3)
How much is this? 偌濟錢? (goa7-che7-chin5)
Sorry 失禮 (sit-le2), 歹勢 (phain2-se3)
Thank you


Response
多謝 Click here to hear this phrase (to-sia7)
不客氣 (bian2 kheh-khi3)
Where's the toilet? 便所佇叨位? (piān-só ti7 to2-ui7)
I love you 我愛你 (gua2 ai3 li2)
Call the police! 叫警察! (gio ging-tsad)
Merry Christmas
and Happy New Year
聖誕節快樂 (Sèng-tàn-chiat Khòai-lo̍k) - Merry Christmas
新年出頭天 (Sin-nî Chhut-thâu-thiⁿ) - Happy New Year

If you would like to make any corrections or additions to this page, please contact me. If you can provide audio recordings of any of these phrases, please send them to my email address

You can send me audio files in any format. If you don't know how to make recordings on a computer, you can send me recordings on audio cassette. Let me know if you want to do this and I'll send you my snailmail address. Or you can call me on Skype (omniglot) and I'll do the recording.

Chinese Translation
Chinese Translation
Get names and phrases translated into Chinese

Other collections of Taiwanese phrases

http://wikitravel.org/en/Taiwanese_phrasebook

Information about Taiwanese

books   Language learning materials for Taiwanese

Phrases in other Chinese languages

Cantonese, Hakka, Mandarin, Shangainese, Taiwanese

Phrases in other languages

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