This spoken English lesson you will help you to learn useful English speaking expressions to give compliments and also the expressions you can use to receive compliments. We often have to give or receive compliments in our day-to-day English conversation and it’s a good etiquette to compliment someone. This English speaking lesson is from our basic English speaking course conducted at our English speaking institute in Mumbai, Thane & Navi Mumbai.
All of us like to receive compliments because when you get a genuine compliment, it instantly brightens up your mood and makes your day. Let’s have a look at some common expressions to compliment someone about the way they look (appearance)
English phrases to give compliments.
- You look lovely
- I like your new look
- This colour looks great on you.
- To compliment someone for their talent
- You have an amazing voice
- I love the way you dance
- You are so good at…..sketching, artwork, singing, etc.
- To compliment someone for their work
- You have worked very hard on it, it shows.
- Simply – great job
- It looks like you have put in hours or looks like you have put in a lot of effort
English phrases to give compliments.
Remember it’s best to receive a compliment gracefully instead of feeling awkward and not responding. Some common responses are
- Thank you for saying that
- I appreciate that/it.
- That’s so sweet/ nice of you.
We hope this spoken English lesson has given you a good idea on how to give and receive compliments effectively. Remember a genuine compliment will always be appreciated.
Complete Lesson Transcript –
Hi everyone, my name is Sonia and thank you so much for selecting this video. Tell me something today, do you like receiving compliments? Well, I do, I love receiving compliments. You know when you compliment someone that’s the best thing that you can do for them because when you give someone a compliment or say something good about them, instantly you feel so positive and that person feels so good. So in English, if you want to give and receive good or great compliments to people, there are very simple and easy expressions that you can use. Today we’re going to do a lesson on giving and receiving compliments. So let’s get started and see what are the different, amazing expressions that we can use to give these compliments to people.
Now I’ve made life very easy for you. When do you give compliments to people? We compliment people for various things like the way they look, or some work that they’ve done or maybe a talent that they possess and various other things like that. So what I’ve done is I’ve divided the board and put up a few topics here, on how you can give people compliments.
The very first section that I have is to compliment someone on their appearance. Now look at the first phrase, it says, you look lovely. When can you use this? Now it’s casual yet it can even be used at a workplace. So for example, if you have a colleague who’s dressed up for some occasion. Maybe it’s her birthday or her wedding anniversary and she’s looking really good. You could walk up to her and say, Hey you know what Sam, you look lovely today or if it’s a guy, you could say, you look really handsome today, you look great.
The next one I have for you is also a very interesting compliment, it says, I like your new look. Now when can you use this one? It has to be very specific, right? so for example, if you know someone, maybe a friend or a colleague at work, who’s always had the same look for a long time, has never really experimented with the way they look but suddenly, they show up to work with their brand new hairstyle or something very different, something they’ve never worn before and they look really good. You could tell them, well I like your new look, it really suits you. I’m sure that’ll make that person’s day.
The next one here is also a very specific compliment on someone’s appearance. It says this colour looks good on you. You could even say, this colour looks great on you. Now sometimes, people don’t really experiment with the colours that they wear. many times we tend to wear the same kind of color just because we’re not very sure about them but if a friend of yours has worn a color which is something very unique but very different and is really looking good on them, you could say, hey you know what, this colour looks great on your or this colour looks good on you. Instead of just saying, you look nice, give them a specific compliment. I’m sure they’ll really like it.
So these are three interesting phrases that you can use to give someone a compliment on their appearance. That’s on the way that they look.
The next one that I have for you. The next set of three phrases talk about giving compliments to someone for their talent. Now we all have talents, right? Everyone is good at something or the other. So how do you give someone a compliment about their talent? Look at this one, you have an amazing voice. So if you have a friend or even a family member or anyone you are familiar with, who sings extremely well, this is a great compliment to give. You can tell them, well hey, you sang extremely well today, you have an amazing voice. And remember whenever you give a compliment to someone, it’s extremely important to sound very genuine and to sound confident and sound nice as well. Look at this word, amazing, when you say it like that, it automatically sounds so good.
The next one here is, I love the way you dance. I’m a lover of dance, alright and if I see someone who dances extremely well, this is a great compliment to give them. You could say, I love the way you dance, you dance extremely well. It’s a pleasure to watch you.
The next one here is, something that you can for a lot of different kind of talents. It starts with, you are so good at. So for example, if someone’s good at, you know sketching or drawing, you could tell them, you are so good at, sketching or maybe you are so good at making a speech. That’s also a talent. So this is a very good, very useful one. You can use it for various different kinds of talents, alright.
Now the next section here, this is specifically to compliment someone when they have done something good. Some kind of good work. Okay, maybe you could use them at the office. You could even use these phrases to encourage a student, alright. So, for example, the first one, says, you’ve worked very hard on it and it shows. Let’s say you know, you’re a manager may be at work and there was a project that you had given to one of your teammates and he’s really done a good job. So it’s not enough to just say, hey good job or nicely done. You could say something like this, you could say, well hey oh, you’ve worked really hard on it and it actually shows. So this is, you know it acts a compliment. It’s also very encouraging. The next time the person will want to do an even better job.
The next one here, very simple but always effective. You could tell the person, well that’s simply a great job, alright. If someone’s even got a promotion, you can say, well that’s a great job, you’ve got a promotion and you’re going to climb up the ladder now.
The final one that I have for you here with relation to work says, it looks like you have put in hours. Now, this you could possibly use for someone who you really know has worked hard. They’ve put in a lot of effort to do some kind of work. That’s when you can tell them this, it looks like you’ve put in hours which means, and it looks like you have put in, a lot of effort. This is a great compliment to give to someone who’s done some kind of work for the very first time because this will also act as a very encouraging statement for them.
So these are a couple of expressions that you can use, three of them for someone’s appearance, another three for a talent that one possesses and finally for the work that someone has done.
Now obviously giving compliments is important but we should also know how to receive compliments, right? So now what we’re gonna look at quickly is how to receive compliments.
So like I said, it’s also important to be able to receive a compliment graciously. Sometimes we feel shy or we awkward when someone gives us a compliment but don’t do that. It’s a great thing, someone appreciates you and you should take that graciously. So let’s look at some three very easy and simple expressions to receive a compliment.
The first one, thank you for saying that. It’s so simple, okay even if you feel a bit shy or awkward, just make a nice sentence and say, thank you for saying that if someone gives you a compliment.
The next one is even better, it says I appreciate that. So if someone has complimented you for you know a good presentation that you made or maybe some kind of work that you’ve done which has turned out really well. You could simply say, well thank you so much, I appreciate that.
Finally, there’s also another very casual expression that you can use where you can say, that’s so nice of you. Alright, this is really nice because this compliment in turn also makes the other person feel really good about giving you a compliment.
So three very simple expressions that you can use when you want to give a response to someone’s compliment. Alright, so I hope that you’ve enjoyed this lesson. I hope you’ve enjoyed watching the video. It’s a very simple lesson yet very effective for your day to day conversation. I’ll be back soon with something interesting, till then you take care and keep practising, bye- bye.
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