Ways to Say Goodbye in Russian

In one of my previous lessons we learned some basic greetings in Russian. Now it’s time to learn how to say goodbye in our beautiful language.

Don’t worry, there arn’t so many ways of doing this. Again, you can learn the most common phrases and this will be enough. However, I’ll try to describe all the possible cases to make it clearer for you. Because sometimes you can hear something unusual from your Russian friend.

До свидания

The most common way is to take a leave with a phrase до свидания [duh svee-dah-nee-ye]. But this sounds very formal. You can say it to your teacher, for example, to the older person or to your boss. It is very useful for many formal situations.

Пока

Another great way to say bye is пока [pah-kah]. It is, on the contrary, very informal. It is used mostly among friends. But not only. For example, you meet someone of your age for the first time, you get acquainted, you don’t know each other well but you can still say “poka” to him or her.

Всего хорошего or Всего доброго

Sometimes we wish all the best to other people when we leave. Всего хорошего and Всего доброго literally mean “all the good”. Saying either of these phrases you wish good things to the person. These expressions are quite common in formal situations.

До встречи

If you are planning to meet the person you are talking to again, you can simply say до встречи. Honestly, I rarely hear this in everyday speaking but you may come across this word in books, on TV or in some article. Another version of this phrase is до скорой встречи. This means you are going to meet this person soon again. There is a pop song in Russian which says:

До скорой встречи, до скорой встречи. Моя любовь к тебе навечно.

But, again, this phrase is not popular in everyday speaking. It’s better that you use more casual “poka”.

До скорого

This expression literally means “until soon”. Not so popular in speaking, as well. You can rarely hear it somewhere.

До завтра

The equivalent of “untill tomorrow” or “see you tomorrow” in English is до завтра. More popular than two previous phrases but not so common as “poka”.

До вечера

This literally means “until evening”. Might be said when you’re going to meet someone in the evening of the current day. In such situation this is a very suitable way to say bye.

Прощай/прощайте

The last way of saying goodbye is an actual farewell. You say this phrase when you leave the place forever and never going to see these people again. Прощай is what you say to one person. If there is more than one person, you say прощайте. Or, you also say прощайте in formal conversation.

Other phrases

There are some more phrases you can say when you are leaving. For example:

Мне пора идти. – It’s time for me to go. (You can just say мне пора, it’s actually the same)

Счастливо оставаться! – Have a nice stay. (Or just Счастливо!)

Note: Счастливо means happily, so by saying this you wish a happy life to those who stays or leave.Счастливо оставаться you only say to those who stay.

Счастливого пути! – Have a nice trip!

Удачи! – Good luck!

If you want to see examples of how all these phrases are used, watch this video. It won’t take you much time to watch it. At the same time, you’ll be able to learn more.