How to Say Cheers Around the World

Almost every culture has a word for the moment you raise a glass. It's usually short, easy to say and meant to be shouted a little. Here's a quick tour, plus a few customs that matter more than the word itself.

Twelve ways to say cheers

• ¡Salud! (Spanish): sah-LOOD. It means "health".
• Santé! (French): sahn-TAY. Also "health".
• Prost! (German): PROHST. Short and loud.
• Salute! (Italian): sah-LOO-teh. You'll also hear cin cin, which imitates the sound of glasses touching.
• Na zdrowie! (Polish): nah ZDRO-vyeh. "To your health".
• Na zdraví! (Czech): nah ZDRAH-vee. Very similar, and also about health.
• За здоровье! (Russian): zah zdah-ROH-vyeh. Once again, health.
• Skål! (Swedish and Norwegian): skohl. The same word, spelled skål, appears across Scandinavia.
• Sláinte! (Irish): SLAWN-cheh. Yes, health again.

• 乾杯 (Japanese, kanpai): kahn-pie. Literally "dry the cup".
• 건배 (Korean, geonbae): guhn-beh. Same idea as the Japanese word.
• გაუმარჯოს (Georgian, gaumarjos): gow-MAR-jos. It means "victory" or "to your success", which makes it a bit different from the rest.

Customs matter more than the word

Knowing the word is the easy part. The manners around it vary a lot:

• In Germany and Hungary, eye contact during a toast is a point of etiquette, so people look at each other as they clink.
• In Japan, it's polite to pour drinks for others instead of filling your own glass first, and to wait for someone to pour yours.
• In Korea, when drinking with someone older, people often turn slightly away from the elder as they drink, and pour with both hands as a sign of respect.
• In many places, the host leads the first toast, so wait for that before you start.

It doesn't have to involve alcohol

All of these work with water, juice or tea. In plenty of countries and communities, people don't drink alcohol at all, and a toast with a soft drink is completely normal. Nobody needs a reason to skip it.

Why bother

Because a toast is a tiny ritual, and tiny rituals are what people remember about trips and dinners. Learning one in someone's language is one of the quickest ways to show you're curious about their world.

And if you're chatting with someone who has just invited you to "raise a glass" to something, now you know what to say back.