Is “на здоровье” a toast in Russian?

Смешной визит к врачу с больной головой

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A2 Russian listening practice · Standard Russian · Curated for beginners

💡 Did you know?
на здоровье (na zdorov’ye)
Russian false toast
“you’re welcome” (especially after food), not “cheers!”

Many foreigners think на здоровье is the Russian toast. It isn’t: Russians don’t usually clink glasses with it. На здоровье (“to your health”) is what you say back when someone thanks you, especially for food: спасибо, очень вкусно! — на здоровье! For a toast, Russians say за здоровье! or будем!

The на vs за difference matters: за means “(drink) to,” as in за нас!, “to us!” Polish na zdrowie is the toast, which is probably where the mix-up spreads from. The sketch ends with a deadpan exchange after a very odd consultation: спасибо, доктор — на здоровье.

Vocabulary frequency

How common is the vocabulary in this A2 Russian listening practice listening practice?

81.1%
of words are in the top 2,000 most common Russian words
Based on this reel’s transcript, most of the vocabulary is high-frequency, everyday Russian.

General Russian frequency

74.5%
Top 1,000
81.1%
Top 2,000
95.3%
Top 5,000

Spoken Russian frequency

82%
Top 1,000
94%
Top 2,000
100%
Top 5,000
👄 Conversational vocabulary
This reel’s words appear more often in subtitle-based spoken-Russian data than in general usage, so it may feel closer to everyday conversation.

Words above this video’s level

Quick glosses for vocabulary that goes beyond this video’s A2 level.

выйдите
1×
Rare / outside top 5,000
дозировку
1×
Rare / outside top 5,000
мигрень
1×
Rare / outside top 5,000
migraine
скольки
1×
Rare / outside top 5,000
увеличим
1×
Rare / outside top 5,000
голова болит
1×
headache

Source: wordfreq 3.1.1 (general) · OpenSubtitles 2018 (HermitDave) (spoken). Buckets approximate; exact ranks not stored.

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