What is the difference between bonjour and salut?

Bonjour works with anyone. Salut is familiar: friends, family, people you call tu.

When do you stop saying bonjour?

In the evening, when bonsoir takes over as the greeting.

It is neutral. The formality comes from what follows it: a title and vous with a stranger, a first name and tu with a friend.

French · phrasebook

How to say hello in French

Hello in French is bonjour. It is the greeting for everyone: a friend in the morning, a baker, a colleague, a stranger you are about to ask for directions. It carries no register of its own, so it is never wrong.

Aurélien CuvelierSep 19, 2026

bonjour

hello

anyone

The ways to say it

bonjour

hello

anyone

How to use it

French greets before anything else. In the second exchange the customer opens with bonjour and a title before asking for bread, and the baker answers the same way. Starting with the request and no greeting reads as rude in France, however polite the rest of the sentence is.

Two other greetings share the ground. Salut is the familiar one, for friends, family and people your own age. Bonsoir takes over in the evening. The exchanges for both are further down this page.

Watch out

Salut to a stranger is the usual slip. It is friendly in intent and too familiar in effect: with anyone you would call vous, the greeting is bonjour.

In a real conversation

Each exchange is a line and its reply. Greyed letters are written and not pronounced. A tie marks a liaison, with the sound you hear under it. A label under a verb names its tense when it is not the present.

Bonjour Léa ! Tu vas bien ce matin ?Hello Léa! Are you doing well this morning?Bonjour ! Ça va, et toi ?Hello! I'm fine, and you?

Bonjour madame ! Je voudrais deux croissants, s'il vous plaît.Hello madam! I would like two croissants, please.Bonjour monsieur ! Voilà, ça fait deux euros.Hello sir! Here you go, that comes to two euros.

Next to it: salut

Salut Léa, ça va ?Hi Léa, how are you?Salut ! Ça va, et toi ?Hi! I'm fine, and you?

Salut, je m'appelle Hugo. Je suis le frère de Marie.Hi, my name is Hugo. I'm Marie's brother.Salut Hugo ! Moi, c'est Paul.Hi Hugo! I'm Paul.

Next to it: bonsoir

Bonsoir Léa, tu rentres du travail maintenant ?Good evening Léa, are you coming home from work now?Bonsoir ! Oui, je suis fatiguée, la journée était longue.Good evening! Yes, I am tired, the day was long.

Bonsoir madame, vous fermez bientôt ?Good evening madam, are you closing soon?Bonsoir monsieur, dans dix minutes. Vous avez le temps.Good evening sir, in ten minutes. You have time.

Questions people ask

What is the difference between bonjour and salut?: Bonjour works with anyone. Salut is familiar: friends, family, people you call tu.
When do you stop saying bonjour?: In the evening, when bonsoir takes over as the greeting.
Is bonjour formal?: It is neutral. The formality comes from what follows it: a title and vous with a stranger, a first name and tu with a friend.

More French phrases

Each one with its tu and vous forms, its register and real exchanges.

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Written by

Aurélien Cuvelier Founder, NuanceDeck

Aurélien Cuvelier builds NuanceDeck: the app, and the verification pipeline behind its dictionary. Every entry is grounded in the official TORFL lexical minimum and a 20,000-word frequency corpus, and every example sentence passes a certification review before it ships.

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