20 Ways to Wish Good Luck Congratulations 29 Alternative English Phrases
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hello everyone and welcome back to
english with lucy today we are going to
look at the phrases
good luck and congratulations
and i’m going to show you lots of better
more interesting alternatives
to further help you with your studies
and understanding
i have created a free pdf worksheet that
goes with this lesson
if you would like to download that just
click on the link in the description box
enter your first name and your email
address
you sign up to my mailing list and i
will send the pdf
directly to your inbox very exciting
it also includes a quiz i know
you will love quizzes first let’s take a
look
at good luck this is a very good phrase
but
it’s boring if we repeat it over and
over again
the first alternative is all the best
or i wish you all the best and this is
not a direct
translation of good luck we usually use
this phrase when we are saying goodbye
to somebody
or we are parting ways especially
at the end of a letter or email all the
best
or i wish you all the best means i hope
you succeed
good luck
number two is break a leg
break a leg i wonder if you’ve heard of
this one before
it’s very popular because it sounds
so strange and almost a little rude
where does that come from
it is supposed that it was said to
actors
before they went on stage because it was
considered
unlucky to wish them luck so
if you wish somebody bad luck like
breaking a leg
supposedly the opposite will occur
they’ll have
good luck and their legs will remain
intact
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number three is a phrase that i use a
lot
in a different context i’ll explain it
to you it is
blow them away blow them away
now if somebody is blown away it means
they are
shocked normally in a positive way
i was blown away by all of your lovely
messages for example
so if your friend is going to an
interview or an audition
and you want to wish them luck you can
say blow them away and that means
shock and surprise them in a positive
way
like most things it all depends on tone
of voice so if i say i was
blown away by the amount of litter in
the park
obviously i’m shocked in a negative way
i’m not impressed
number four we have knock him dead and
you have to do the fist movement it is
obligatory
knock him dead um in this case
is them knock them dead
knock him dead the meaning is very
similar
to that of blow them away to knock
somebody dead is to really impress them
again it depends on the context if you
hit someone with a car
and you knock them dead well
that’s not very good at all
number five is a very common phrase that
i think also exists in many other
languages
it is fingers crossed fingers crossed
i’ve crossed my fingers for you i’m
hoping for the best
so when we cross our fingers it means we
are wishing luck for either
ourselves or other people is that the
same in your language or is it something
different please let me know in the
comments i love
knowing about the little quirks of all
your languages
number six just a very slight variation
on good luck we have
best of luck best of luck and this is a
shortened version of i wish you the best
of luck
but in casual speech we just go straight
in for
best of luck
another very similar one is number seven
which is
wishing you the best or i wish you the
best
number eight another similar one all the
best to you
all the best to you i wish you the best
number nine is possibly my favorite
go get em tiger the uh the rare
hands are optional but recommended
this is very informal very slang and it
just means
go and do it i know you can go and
impress them
and the last one number 10 you got this
now it should be
you’ve got this but sometimes we remove
the
at the end of you and just say you got
this
you got this obviously if you’re writing
it
down put you’ve got this
so there we have it 10 very nice
alternatives for
good luck let’s move on to alternatives
better alternatives for congratulations
there are a few more of this one there
are many alternatives i have
19 for you and i’m going to check your
understanding
in the quiz in the pdf so make sure you
pay attention
number one is my respects and if you
offer somebody your respects
in a positive way it means that they
have impressed you
now if you say my respects to you in a
solemn
or serious voice it could mean
that something bad has happened to that
person and you are offering them
your condolences but in a positive tone
of voice
my respect is wow you’ve impressed me
number two is hats off hats off to you
this comes from taking your hat off to
somebody and if you take your hat off to
somebody
it means that you are impressed with
them and you respect them
so if somebody has achieved something
amazing you can say hats off to you
that’s fantastic
number three is a word just one word
but i absolutely love it it is
sensational
amazing sensational we have a very very
posh friend
and he got completely addicted to the
word
sensational you know when you have a
word a new word in your head and you
find yourself using it
at every opportunity or his word was
sensational sensational sensational
today was sensational but used in the
right context
sensational can mean congratulations
number four is one that my mother uses
quite a lot
it is get in there
often shortened down to get in
you have to do the fist okay yes you can
use it to congratulate other people or
also yourself
if you hear that you’ve won a prize you
can say
get in there get in yes
very very informal
number five is more of an american
phrase we don’t use it
as much in british english and i will
show you why
it is you rock and that means
you are awesome and in american english
it sounds so cool
i grew up watching american tv shows all
the time
they always used to say you rock but in
british english in my accent
it doesn’t sound cool at all you rock
there are so many phrases that i i just
think they sound ridiculous when i say
them
go get em tiger
the next one however is very british
very british and it’s it’s rising again
people are starting to use it more and
with good reason i love it
it is good show or
jolly good show it’s quite posh jolly
the word jolly
means kind of very or extremely jolly on
its own means happy or cheerful but we
can use it instead of
very or really jolly good show
means really well done well done you
congratulations
number seven feels slightly more
american to me it’s nice going
nice going it translates to you’ve done
well
very well
number eight is good for you or
good on you be careful with your tone of
voice
here because if you say oh good for you
that can sound extremely sarcastic so if
somebody has something
that you want and you say oh good for
you it’s kind of saying
you get everything i want that but if
you say it with real
meaning and heart good for you well done
it means i’m really really happy for you
number nine is very similar it is well
done you
well done you you’ve probably heard well
done
on its own but for extra emphasis well
done you that’s really really great
number 10 beautifully casual nice one
nice one well done nice one that
translates to
good job yeah nice one
number 11 is so simple but i love it it
is you did it
you did it congratulations i think
that’s what my mother said to me when
she found out that i had got
a high score for my university degree
she said you did it
it’s a really nice way of saying
congratulations
number 12 is lovely if somebody does
something
really clever really intelligent you can
say
you’re a genius you are a genius
number 13 is way to go way to go
now this is another one that sounds
slightly more american to me
i’m not sure about australia and canada
and places like that
if you’re watching please let me know we
don’t say as much
in the uk but it’s still a really nice
one
way to go very well done
number 14 is great for
self-congratulation
as well as congratulating others it is
pat on the back it’s quite popular
nowadays if you yourself do something
well
then you can say oh well done me
pat on the back if you pat someone on
the back it means
well done
15 is a really nice one quite casual oh
you made that look easy
if somebody’s done a performance or has
been in an interview and has performed
really well
you can say well you made that look easy
that was amazing congratulations
number 16 is one that i use all the time
especially with my students if i see
that they’ve been performing really
really well
then i say keep up the good work it
means you’ve done
so well until now continue to do well
because you’re on track for success
number 17 is nothing can stop you now
you are on a roll to be on a roll means
to have a continued period of success
or good luck
number 18 is a relatively new one it is
you’re
on fire you are on fire if i speak to a
fellow youtuber
and i say your channel is on fire at the
moment it means it’s doing so well
congratulations or
you’re on fire you’re doing so well
again
context and tone of voice is everything
if i tell someone
you’re on fire it means that they should
seek water
asap as soon as possible
i’ve saved the best one till last it is
number 19
and it is congratu expletive
latiance so we insert a swear word
or an expletive between congratu
and lations for example congratulations
that’s amazing
god that’s so fun to say congratulations
now i don’t teach swear words on my
channel so you’re going to have to
search those up for yourself google is
your friend
right that is it for today’s lesson i
hope you enjoyed it and i hope you
learned something
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this quiz
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i will see you soon for another lesson
my respect to you i find that really
hard to say one second
my respects my respects to you
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