The 500 Spanish phrases you actually need

We chose 500 phrases for common situations in a first month in Spain, and we would rather you had them grouped by what happens in a day than a longer list sorted by grammar. This page is that list: 18 situations, from the first Hola to telling a colleague what you think, across three lanes, survive (210 phrases), travel (154) and work (136). Every row is something a polite adult says out loud, written and reviewed by us. The one thing the page will not do is teach grammar; ¿Me trae la cuenta, por favor? gets you the bill whether or not you know why the verb ends that way.

How to read the tables

Each table has three columns: the Spanish, the English, and a note. The note is there when the translation leaves something out, and 116 of the 500 rows carry one.

Register: the survive and travel tables address strangers as usted, as a polite default; the choice varies by age, relationship and setting. The work tables lean on tú, as many colleagues use it; follow the workplace's usage or ask ¿Nos tuteamos? before switching. Variety: the phrases are the Spain forms, with the Latin American word in the note where daily use differs.

These 500 phrases are on the website for now; they are not yet an app pack. Vocabcord currently plays entries from its vocabulary packs at each plug-in; the reasoning is in one word per charge. On paper, use your browser's print or save the page as a PDF; each section has its own heading.

First contact: greeting, thanking, apologising

Buenas is an informal greeting you will hear walking into a bakery; Buenos días is useful too. Lo siento expresses regret or an apology, while Con permiso is useful for asking to squeeze past someone. Perdone que le moleste politely opens a request. ¿Habla inglés? is also a reasonable question when you need to switch languages. Vale is especially common in Spain; the note gives an alternative for Latin America.

Understanding each other: the repair kit

The repair kit comes second because the first thing that happens after a greeting is that you stop understanding. No entiendo and Más despacio, por favor do most of the work; said early, the second one slows the whole exchange to your speed. The row people get wrong is ¿Cómo? It is the polite way to ask for a repeat; English speakers reach for ¿qué? because it looks like what, and it sounds curt. ¿Me explico? is the other trap: it checks you are being understood, while ¿me entiende? can land as a challenge.

Getting around: streets, buses, trains, taxis

The row everyone asks about is ¿Dónde puedo coger un taxi? In Spain, coger is the everyday verb for taking any bus, train or taxi. In Mexico, Argentina and much of Latin America it is obscene, so say tomar there; it is the most useful regional warning on the page. ¿Me avisa cuando lleguemos? is worth learning for the bus: ask as you board, the driver nods, and the nod is honoured. Driving is missing on purpose. A first month in Spain happens on foot and on transit, and Quiero alquilar un coche is the only concession.

Hotel and lodging: checking in, problems, checking out

¿Cuál es la contraseña del wifi? is a pronunciation trap: Spaniards say wee-fee, and the English version draws a blank at reception. El piso está en el tercero is here for the false friend; piso is a flat in Spain and the floor under your feet in Latin America. The section runs past hotels: ¿Dónde dejo las llaves al irme? and the three complaint rows are what a rented flat needs, and a rented flat is where most first months are spent.

Eating out: ordering, allergies, paying

La carta, por favor comes first. The menu you want is la carta; el menú in Spain is the fixed-price set lunch, and ¿Tienen menú del día? is on the list as the best-value meal in the country. ¿Me trae la cuenta, por favor? matters because nobody brings the bill unasked; the table sits until you catch the waiter's eye. We would rather you learned Que aproveche than any dish name: it is said to strangers eating nearby, and saying it back is the quickest way to stop being a tourist at the table.

Shopping and paying: tills, sizes, returns, queues

If you learn one phrase from this table, make it ¿Quién es el último? Spanish queues at markets, clinics and bakeries have no line: you ask who is last, remember that person, and you are behind them. Newcomers stand where a line ought to be and get skipped. ¿Me cobra, por favor? is how you get a shopkeeper's attention when you are ready to pay, and it is the phrase newcomers most often do not know they need. There is no bargaining row because Spanish shops have fixed prices.

Numbers, times and dates as they come up

There is no number table here, on purpose. A column of numbers is a thing to read and a number inside a sentence is a thing to say, so these 22 rows put numbers where they turn up. Tengo treinta y dos años is the row to get right first, because age takes tener and soy treinta y dos is the classic first-week slip. Llegué el quince de marzo settles the date order: day, then month, and only the first of the month takes an ordinal. Planta baja is the ground floor, which is why Está en la primera planta puts you one flight up.

Health and pharmacy: symptoms, prescriptions, appointments

Start at the pharmacy, because in Spain that is where a cold gets treated, and ¿Dónde hay una farmacia? carries the note about the green cross and the all-night farmacia de guardia. Estoy resfriado comes with the false friend: constipado means you have a cold in Spain and has nothing to do with digestion. Most of what you tell a doctor is Me duele aquí with a pointed finger. The crossover with work is Necesito una baja médica: la baja is both the sick leave and the note. Body parts and anything diagnostic are missing by design.

Emergencies: help, police, theft

Twenty rows, because in an emergency you will say two of them and the rest will be said to you. ¿Cuál es el número de emergencias? is on the list so the note can tell you 112 across Spain and the EU and 911 in Mexico and much of Latin America. At a police station the fixed phrase is Quiero poner una denuncia, and the insurer needs that report more than the police do. Déjeme en paz is the phrase we hope you never say and want you to have.

Phone, data and deliveries

¿Cuántos gigas tiene? shows why this section exists: the shop writes datos on the sign, the person behind the counter says gigas, and a phrasebook written before the smartphone has neither. ¿Tiene permanencia? is the question that saves you months of payments; permanencia is the lock-in, prepago the way out. The delivery half is about the building, because that is where parcels get lost. Deje el paquete en la portería works because most Spanish blocks have a portero, and Es el segundo B teaches the address format that confuses every newcomer: floor, then letter.

Admin, forms and the landlord

This is the section a phrasebook never prints, and it is the one that decides whether your first month in Spain goes well. Quiero empadronarme comes before almost everything else, because the padrón is the town hall register that everything else asks for. Necesito sacarme el NIE is the number every foreigner needs to work or rent, and ¿Dónde pido cita previa? is the sentence you say before both, since walking into a Spanish office rarely works. The landlord rows use fianza for the rental deposit. For housing leases covered by Spain's rental law, the statutory fianza is one month's rent; an additional guarantee can also be agreed within legal limits. Ask which amounts are being requested and what each covers. See Article 36 of the rental law.

First day at work: introductions, the building, shifts

¿Nos tuteamos? is the most important row in the work lane. Ask it once, early, and tú versus usted is settled for the whole office, because most Spanish workplaces run on tú from the first morning; keep saying usted at the coffee machine and you sound like a visitor. ¿Vamos a tomar un café? comes next: the mid-morning coffee is where a Spanish team becomes yours, and the right answer in the first week is yes. The table runs past the office on purpose: helmets, gloves and ¿Cuál es mi turno? are there because a first job is as often on a site or in a kitchen.

Meetings and calls, in the room and remote

These rows are tú throughout; the note on ¿Me pasas el enlace? says why once for the whole table. The word to learn is inside Tengo una duda: duda is useful when you need something clarified. Tengo una pregunta is also a normal way to ask a question in a meeting. The remote rows are the ones a course skips, and Tienes el micro apagado gets said in every call in every office in Spain. Presentation language is missing because you read that off a slide.

Email and messages: openings, attachments, sign-offs

Sign off with Un saludo. It is the everyday close for a Spanish email, saludos cordiales is stiffer, and atentamente belongs to formal letters, so the sign-off a textbook prints is the one you will use least. Te escribo por lo de la factura is on the list for lo de, the two words Spaniards use for any topic both people already know. ¿Me pones en copia? is there because poner en copia is how cc gets said out loud. Most of the table is tú, and Quedo a la espera de su respuesta is the one usted line, kept for customers.

Asking for help, owning mistakes, deadlines

We would rather you learned Creo que me he equivocado before ¿Me puedes dar un día más?, because owning the mistake is what buys the extra day, and the table puts them in that order. The deadline word is in ¿Cuál es el plazo? Spaniards say plazo; fecha límite is the date on the form. Two rows are easy to confuse: Estoy de baja is official sick leave with a doctor's note, and estoy malo is what you text first thing in the morning. Ya está closes the section because it closes everything else: finished, sorted, that is it.

Money at work: pay, contracts, holidays

¿Cuánto se cobra? opens the table because the verb is the point: cobrar refers to receiving payment, while ganar also means to earn. Both are normal in conversations about pay. Two false friends follow. ¿Hay dietas? asks about per-diem allowances and has nothing to do with a diet; Necesito la nómina asks for the payslip, which the landlord in the admin section will want. ¿Es un contrato indefinido? is the one to ask before signing: indefinido is permanent, temporal is fixed-term. Salary negotiation stops at Quiero pedir un aumento; the rest of that conversation is yours.

Small talk with strangers and sightseeing

Hace calor opens more conversations in Spain than any question does. With strangers the table stays on usted, so ¿Es usted de aquí? is the form for a bar, and the other person will switch you to tú if they want to. Dos entradas, por favor is here for the word: entrada is a ticket for a museum or a show, billete is for transport, and asking for un billete at a museum door gets a puzzled look. Football, politics and religion are missing; the table gives you the openers and the exits.

Feelings and opinions

The list ends here on purpose: the last thing a newcomer learns to say is what they think. Me da igual is the trap: to a shopkeeper it sounds like you do not care; the note hands you cualquiera. To turn down a price politely, say Me parece caro; it lands as an opinion, and an opinion offends no one. The word we would put on the wall is Ojalá, one word from Arabic that covers hopefully, I wish and let us hope. Twenty-two rows is the floor for a person's inner life, and the section we expect to grow first when the pack is built.

What we cut, and what to add for yourself

Four kinds of phrase were cut. Proverbs, because nobody in a queue says más vale pájaro en mano. Textbook sentences, the ones that exist to show off a tense; if I had known can wait for the second month. Slang, because it dates and marks you as trying: vale is in, mola is out. And anything a course teaches for grammar rather than use, which is why vosotros appears in no row; a newcomer who says ustedes to a group is never wrong in Spain and always right in Latin America.

Two whole situations were cut with regret: children (the school gate, the paediatrician, the parents' group chat) and driving. What you should add is your trade. Your kitchen, ward or building site has phrases this page cannot know, so print the section closest to your day, write yours in the margin, and treat 500 as the floor. If we rebuilt the list tomorrow, the feelings table would be longer and the hotel table shorter.

How 500 phrases stick without a study plan

Vocabcord plays one phrase each time the phone goes on the charger: the Spanish, a pause, the English, a pause, the Spanish again. At five plug-ins a day that is about 150 playbacks in a 30-day month, including repeats. It is not a count of new phrases learned. Which phrase plays is chosen by a weighted decay sampler: a phrase's weight grows with the days since you last heard it, and one you have never heard counts as about twenty days overdue, so new entries and those you have not heard recently get better odds. The sampler does not measure what you remember.

This collection is published here first. It becomes a pack in the app, with text-to-speech audio for every row, and we are not promising a date. Until then the Spanish in the app is the graded vocabulary corpus, 4,710 entries from A1 to C2; the Spanish corpus statistics page shows how they split by level and theme.

Common questions

How many Spanish phrases do you need to get by?

Start with first contact, understanding each other and eating out: 90 phrases between them. For living and working in Spain, the other sections add situations such as forms, renting and meetings. The 500 are a practical selection, not a minimum everyone needs.

Should I learn tú or usted first?

Usted is a useful polite starting point with adult strangers. Tú is common in many everyday and workplace settings in Spain. Follow how people address you, or ask ¿Nos tuteamos? when you want to agree on using tú.

Are these phrases for Spain or Latin America?

The base is Spain, and the note column carries Latin America wherever daily use differs: coche and carro, móvil and celular, zumo and jugo, 112 and 911. The row to read twice is ¿Dónde puedo coger un taxi?, ordinary in Madrid and obscene in Mexico City; say tomar there. All 500 are understood on both sides of the Atlantic.

What is the fastest way to memorise them?

Choose a few phrases for a situation you expect to face, say them aloud and revisit them later. For now, practise these 500 from the page; they are not yet available as an app pack. The app's existing vocabulary packs provide listening practice at each plug-in.

How is this list different from the Spanish in the app?

The app's Spanish is a graded vocabulary corpus: 4,710 single words and short headwords, derived from the New General Service List and graded A1 to C2. This page is 500 sentences people say, written by us. The two meet when the collection becomes a pack.