“How Do You Say in Spanish?”

 The phrase, “How do you say in Spanish?” is “¿Cómo se dice en español?”

For example, if you are talking to a native Spanish speaker and you want to learn how to say “cat”, you would say, “¿Cómo se dice cat en español?”

This is a very useful phrase that can help turn any Spanish speaker into your personal tutor (provided they know some basic English words).

“How do you say in Spanish” is the same if you’re talking about plural words or singular words. For example, “How do you say cars in Spanish?” would be “¿Cómo se dice cars en español?”

If you want a literal breakdown of what it means, the word “cómo” means “how”, the phrase “se dice” means “is it said”, and “en español” means “in Spanish. So, if you said “¿Cómo se dice bike en español?, the literal translation would be “How is it said bike in Spanish?”

In summary, “How do you say in Spanish?” is “¿Cómo se dice en español?”

Now, for a related tip, if you hear a Spanish word and you want to know what it means, a super-useful phrase is, “¿Qué quiere decir?” For example, if you hear the word, “montaña” and you don’t know what it means, you could say, “¿Qué quiere decir montaña?” which means “What does montaña mean?” The literal translation is, “What does it want to say montaña?” (That’s one that really doesn’t translate well into English but native Spanish speakers use it all the time.)

Both of those useful phrases and many more are found in the Visual Link Spanish course, to get it free, just go to the free learn to speak Spanish download page.

Hopefully those language tips give you a little confidence in conversing with native speakers. Practice them and let us know how it goes when you try them out. We’d love to hear your comments on our blog.