One table. Sixteen languages. And one surprisingly useful way to start a conversation.
Imagine you’re at Oktoberfest in Munich. Someone at your table lifts a glass, looks around, and says:
Prost!
You don’t need a grammar lesson to understand what happens next.
That’s what makes toasting expressions so useful for language learners. They’re short, memorable, deeply connected to culture, and likely to come up in real social situations. Better still, the words people use for “cheers” reveal something interesting: different languages aren’t always saying the same thing at all.
Some wish you health.
Some toast to life.
Some literally tell you to empty your glass.
And some don’t even have a single word equivalent to English “cheers.”
So raise your glass—beer, sparkling water, tea, or anything else—and let’s travel through 16 languages, one toast at a time.
First, Does “Cheers” Really Translate?
Not exactly.
English speakers tend to think of cheers as a single concept that should have a direct equivalent in every language. But that’s not how languages work.
A Spanish speaker says ¡Salud!, literally “Health!”
A Hebrew speaker says לחיים! (L’chaim!), or “To life!”
A Mandarin speaker may say 干杯! (Gānbēi!), literally “Dry the cup!”
These expressions perform roughly the same social function, but their literal meanings can be very different.
For language learners, that’s the interesting part.
The Oktoberfest Essential: German — Prost!
Let’s begin in Munich.
German: Prost!
Pronunciation: roughly prohst
Prost! is the everyday German toast you’ll want at Oktoberfest, in a beer garden, or at a casual dinner.
There’s also the longer form Prosit!. The German dictionary Duden traces prosit to Latin and gives its meaning as a call used when people drink together—essentially “May it benefit you.”
If you’re visiting Oktoberfest, you may also hear:
Ein Prosit!
That’s especially familiar from the song Ein Prosit der Gemütlichkeit, regularly heard in beer tents.
One useful distinction for learners:
Prost! = Cheers!
O’zapft is! = It’s tapped!
The famous Bavarian O’zapft is! announces that the first Oktoberfest beer barrel has been tapped. It isn’t another way to say “cheers.”
The “Health” Family
Once you learn this pattern, several European toasts become much easier to remember.
The words look different, but the idea behind them is remarkably similar:
To your health!
Spanish — ¡Salud!
¡Salud!
Pronunciation: roughly sah-LOOD
Salud simply means health.
You’ll hear it across the Spanish-speaking world, although customs and additional expressions naturally vary from country to country.
If you already know:
la salud = health
then you already know the toast.
That’s a useful language-learning trick: a word you first encounter at a party may later appear in conversations about doctors, exercise, or healthy habits.
French — Santé!
Santé!
Pronunciation: roughly sahn-TAY
Again, the literal meaning is health.
You may also encounter:
À votre santé!
To your health!
The French Academy defines a toast as an invitation to drink in honor of a person, wish, or event—showing that the concept is broader than simply clinking glasses and saying one magic word.
Portuguese — Saúde!
Saúde!
Another member of the health family.
Portuguese pronunciation differs noticeably between Brazil, Portugal, and other Portuguese-speaking regions, so treat English pronunciation guides as approximations rather than rules.
The important connection for learners is:
saúde = health
You may recognize its similarity to Spanish salud.
Italian — Salute!
Salute!
Pronunciation: roughly sah-LOO-teh
Yes—health again.
Italian speakers may also use:
Cin cin!
Pronunciation: chin chin
That makes Italian especially useful to know because you’ll encounter more than one casual option.
Polish — Na zdrowie!
Na zdrowie!
Pronunciation: roughly nah ZDROH-vyeh
This means “to health” and really is used as a Polish toast. Cambridge lists na zdrowie as the Polish equivalent of “cheers” when drinking.
Keep this one in mind, because it becomes important when we get to Russian.
Czech — Na zdraví!
Na zdraví!
Pronunciation: roughly nah ZDRAH-vee
If Polish Na zdrowie! looks familiar, Czech Na zdraví! should be easier to remember.
Both connect the toast with health.
For learners studying related languages, expressions like these are a great reminder that vocabulary often travels in families.
Greek — Γεια μας!
Γεια μας!
Romanization: Yia mas!
Pronunciation: roughly YAH mahs
The idea is roughly “to our health.”
The word μας (mas) means “our,” so instead of only wishing health to another person, the expression includes everyone raising a glass.
A Toast to Life: Hebrew — L’chaim!
Some languages choose an even bigger concept than health.
Hebrew: לחיים!
Romanization: L’chaim!
Pronunciation: roughly l’KHAI-im
It means:
To life!
Even people who don’t study Hebrew may recognize L’chaim from movies, songs, weddings, or Jewish celebrations.
For a learner, the useful word is:
חיים (chaim) = life
That’s a good example of why toasting expressions can be more than party vocabulary. One memorable phrase gives you a high-value everyday noun at the same time.
Northern Europe: Proost and Skål
Not every toast is built around the word “health.”
Dutch — Proost!
Proost!
Pronunciation: roughly prohst
If you’re studying both Dutch and German, this one is wonderfully easy:
German: Prost!
Dutch: Proost!
Similar language family, similar toast.
Just don’t assume that every similar-looking word across related languages will behave this conveniently.
Swedish — Skål!
Skål!
Pronunciation: approximately skohl
You’ll also encounter related forms in other Scandinavian languages.
The letter å is worth noticing if you’re a Swedish learner. Toasting gives you a convenient excuse to practice a sound—and a letter—you may not have in English.
To Honor: Turkish — Şerefe!
Turkish: Şerefe!
Pronunciation: roughly sheh-reh-FEH
The expression comes from şeref, meaning honor.
So while Spanish and French drink to health and Hebrew drinks to life, Turkish brings another idea to the table: honor.
It’s exactly the kind of difference that disappears when every expression is translated simply as cheers.
“Dry the Cup”: Mandarin, Japanese, and Korean
Here’s one of the most interesting connections for language learners.
Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, and Korean all have familiar toasting expressions historically built from the same Chinese characters:
乾杯 / 干杯
The literal image is essentially an empty or dry cup.
But the pronunciation is completely different in each language.
Mandarin Chinese — 干杯!
干杯!
Pinyin: Gānbēi!
Pronunciation: roughly gahn-bay
The characters literally suggest “dry the cup.”
That’s why 干杯 can sometimes sound closer to English “bottoms up!” than a gentle “cheers.”
As always, context matters. Knowing the literal meaning does not mean you should assume every person expects you to drain every drink.
Japanese — 乾杯!
乾杯!
Romanization: Kanpai!
Pronunciation: roughly kahn-pie
Japanese uses the same traditional characters, but reads them as kanpai.
Here’s an especially useful cultural correction: although the characters suggest emptying the cup, you do not have to finish your entire drink after saying kanpai. The Japan Foundation explains that people normally take a sip after the toast, and at group events it is common to wait until the initial toast before starting to drink.
So:
乾杯 does not mean you must chug your drink.
That’s the difference between knowing a dictionary definition and knowing how a phrase actually works.
Korean — 건배!
건배!
Romanization: Geonbae!
Pronunciation: roughly guhn-bae
Korean gives us the third version of the same expression.
Compare them:
Mandarin: gānbēi
Japanese: kanpai
Korean: geonbae
They look completely unrelated when written in the Latin alphabet.
But historically, they’re connected.
For people interested in East Asian languages, that’s a much more useful insight than memorizing three isolated translations of the English word cheers.
The One You Shouldn’t Memorize: Russian “Na Zdorovie”
Now for one of the most persistent language-learning myths.
Search for “cheers in Russian” and you may encounter:
На здоровье! (Na zdorovie!)
There’s just one problem.
That’s not the standard Russian equivalent of “Cheers!”
Russia’s Gramota language reference service specifically distinguishes На здоровье! from a toast. It gives forms such as Ваше здоровье! (“Your health!”) or За ваше здоровье! (“To your health!”) for raising a toast, while На здоровье! can be used as a good wish in response to thanks for food or hospitality.
And Russian toasts often name whatever people are drinking to:
За дружбу!
To friendship!
За встречу!
To our meeting!
That makes Russian especially interesting for learners because there isn’t one neat little word you can substitute every time an English speaker would say “cheers.”
And here’s the twist:
The phrase that foreigners often mistakenly think is Russian—
Na zdrowie!
—is perfectly good Polish.
Language learning loves tricks like that.
16 Ways to Say Cheers: Quick Reference
| Language | Expression | Basic idea |
|---|---|---|
| German | Prost! | A traditional drinking toast |
| Spanish | ¡Salud! | Health |
| French | Santé! | Health |
| Portuguese | Saúde! | Health |
| Italian | Salute! / Cin cin! | Health / casual toast |
| Polish | Na zdrowie! | To health |
| Czech | Na zdraví! | To health |
| Greek | Γεια μας! (Yia mas!) | To our health |
| Dutch | Proost! | Cheers |
| Swedish | Skål! | Cheers |
| Turkish | Şerefe! | To honor |
| Hebrew | לחיים! (L’chaim!) | To life |
| Mandarin Chinese | 干杯! (Gānbēi!) | Dry the cup |
| Japanese | 乾杯! (Kanpai!) | Dry the cup |
| Korean | 건배! (Geonbae!) | Dry the cup |
| Russian | За дружбу! / За встречу! | To friendship / to our meeting |
Pronunciations and preferred expressions can vary by country, region, generation, and situation, so think of this as a starting point—not a universal rulebook.
The Real Magic of Toasting Across Cultures
Learning to say cheers in another language isn’t just a party trick — it’s a tiny window into how different people relate to one another. And in a beer tent in Munich, or at a dinner table in Tokyo, or over tapas in Barcelona, saying that one word in the local language can open a door that might otherwise stay closed.
So the next time you raise a glass with someone from a different part of the world, try their word for cheers. Make eye contact, mean it — and see what happens next. Prost!
