Greetings in French
Bonjour, Bonsoir
In general the French are more formal than the English when first meeting or when dealing with customers. When you meet people for the first time, or people who are older, or more senior than you in a professional sense, add monsieur, madame or mademoiselle after Bonjour. The surname is not usually added. Madame is more frequent than mademoiselle which is used only for very young women or a woman who prefers to be known as unmarried person.There is no equivalent for Ms in French. Bonsoir is used instead of bonjour after 6 p.m., and when leaving as well as greeting someone. Bonjour and bonsoir (without monsieur, etc.) are used informally, where we would say Hello.
In a nutshell
Bonjour = Hello
Bonsoir = Good evening
Salut! = Hi
Salut! is more casual than Bonjour and is also used on leaving: ‘bye!’.
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