How are you?

How do you say it in Italian?

There’s more than one way to ask how are you in Italian, and you’ll be very happy to know that these ways depend on the level of formality between you and the people you’re addressing (sniffing sarcasm here…).

Stai and sta are conjugations of the verb stare, which means to stay.

You use come stai? with people you address on a first-name basis, while you use come sta? with elderly people, people you don’t know very well, and generally with people you need to show respect to.

Basically, an i makes the difference between politeness and rudeness. Watch your vowels!

Other common ways of asking how are you in Italian

Va is the third-person singular present tense conjugation of the verb andare, which means to go.

Italians use come va? mostly with friends and relatives. It’s neither formal nor informal, although you’ll rarely hear it in formal situations.

On the other hand, you use come ti va? to ask how are you in Italian to friends with whom you have a very informal relationship. By comparison, it might still be too informal to address a co-worker in this way. I’d say you’re more likely to hear it from uneducated people.

Let’s break them down.

Cosa means what. Mi means to me. Dici is the second person singular conjugation of the verb dire, which means to say. Di bello literally translates to of nice, meaning “things that are nice”.

It could be literally translated as “What do you say to me that’s nice?”.

These forms are informal ways of asking how are you in Italian. If you want a more lively tone, you can add the pronoun mi to the sentence.

Ideally, you would use cosa mi dici di bello? while happily chatting with a close friend after you haven’t seen each other in a while. On this occasion, friends and family members are likely to kiss each other on the cheek.

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How to reply to how are you?

These two sentences are the answers to come sta/i? and come va?, respectively.

It’s common courtesy to reciprocate, so you will ask…

So some standard answers might include…

How are you for concerned friends

Use va tutto bene if you’re concerned about someone else.

And if for some reason you feel like answering something other than what is socially expected in such a situation (Italians will say they feel great even when they clearly don’t!), you can be brutally honest (brutalmente onesto, if you’re a man, or onesta, if you’re a woman) and say…

With affatto that translates at all.

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