Day 1: The 30-Day Spanish Vocabulary Challenge
Welcome to Day 1 of our 30-Day learning Spanish Vocabulary Challenge!
Whether you’re an aspiring polyglot or just looking to brush up on your spanish skills, a robust vocabulary is crucial. Over the next month, we’ll give you multiple spanish vocabulary lists to build your spanish vocabulary through a series of focused lessons covering essential vocabulary themes.
For the next 30 days, treat this series as your own personal vocabulary builder where you stack up important spanish vocabulary in memorable, relevant chunks!
But before we dive into the nitty-gritty, let’s start with the basics – greetings! Being able to greet others politely is one of the most important things in any culture. Wishing someone ‘good morning’ or saying a polite ‘hello’ goes a long way, doesn’t it?
So let’s learn Saludos – Greetings!
| ¡Hola! ola! | Hello / Hi | Hola can be used at any time of the day! |
| Buenos días boo-eynos dee-yaas (pronounce ‘d’ like the English word ‘the’) | Good morning | Buenos días is mostly used in the morning hours till noon. But, you may hear this in the early afternoon hours too. |
| Buenas tardes boo-eynaas taar-deys (‘t’ and ‘d’ have a soft sound) | Good afternoon | Buenas tardes is used in the afternoon hours, from noon till 4-5PM. |
| Buenas tardes / noches boo-eynaas taar-deys / no-cheys (‘t’ and ‘d’ have a soft sound) | Good evening | Now, interestingly, we do not have a separate new greeting for good evening. We simply use Buenas tardes / Buenas noches. |
| Buenas noches boo-eynaas no-cheys | Good night | Buenas noches is used to say Goodnight (but as mentioned above, it can also be used to say Good evening!). |
Notes to remember:
- In formal situations, it’s polite to include a title like señor/señora (Mr./Mrs.) before the greeting.
- Don’t be too surprised when you hear buenos días used into the early afternoon hours – it’s flexible!
Now it’s time to practice what you’ve learned.
Fill in the blanks with the correct Spanish greeting:
- You run into your friend at the grocery store at 8 PM. You say “_____.”
- Arriving at your sister’s house for morning coffee, you say “_____” to say “Good morning”.
- Seeing your neighbors outside gardening at 3 PM, you wave and say “_____” to say “Good afternoon”.
- Before heading to bed for the night, you say “_____” to say “Goodnight”.
¿Listo? – Ready? Let’s check those answers!
- Buenas noches / ¡Hola!
- Buenos días
- Buenas tardes
- Buenas noches
¡Excelente trabajo! Excellent work! You’re off to a great start on your vocabulary building journey. With greetings mastered, you’re ready to learn how to bring a conversation to a close. We’ll learn ways to say ‘Goodbye’ tomorrow!
