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How can I reply to "It was nice to talk to you" properly both formally and casually?

Actually, I want to make this question a bit general, but since I heard this sentence a lot I used it as an example.

What about these options I wrote off the top of my head?

a. the same (for me it sounds too short and informal, but it can be used when texting?)

b. I think so

c. me too

d. It was nice to talk to you too

e. I feel the same

f. ______________________

Mrt
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  • Myself I would use your option c "Me too", or perhaps a combination of c and d: "You too". – IanF1 Jan 04 '15 at 14:22
  • F. 'You too' or 'And you too' or 'And to you too' but you can see where this starts to lead - we would end up saying the same sentence back to them. The first one is extremely informal & actually doesn't make a great deal of sense if you analyse it, but it's a common form. It saves having to essentially say the entire sentence again that they just said to you. Eng is full of these 'is it polite to chop it down too far?' responses. I like Maulik's answer, though - cuts out the repetition. – DoneWithThis. Jan 04 '15 at 15:28
  • Do you want two examples, one for formal and one for casual? Because casual and formal rarely describe the same thing. We don't say wear formal casual clothes or casual formal clothes... :) –  Jan 04 '15 at 15:57
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    There's another thing in both the OP and the title that made me frown in the first place. Is it grammatically correct to say "It was nice to talk..."? As far as I remember, only the -ing form is possible in this context: "It was nice talking to you". – syntaxerror Jan 04 '15 at 17:57
  • http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/1029/is-there-any-difference-between-talk-to-someone-and-talk-with-someone –  Jan 04 '15 at 19:31
  • @CarSmack This will only elaborate on talk to / talk with. But what I was on about in my post above yours was "to be nice talking to..." vs. "to be nice to talk to..." – syntaxerror Jan 04 '15 at 21:10
  • What about "Like wise"? – learner Jan 04 '15 at 22:27
  • @syntaxerror I believe you will find a community wiki I posted below useful. It's in accordance with your suggestions, though other alternatives are also possible. – Damkerng T. Jan 05 '15 at 00:15
  • @learner "Likewise" works. I rarely say it. It sounds to me too formal, and mostly it's cold and unfeeling. –  Jan 05 '15 at 01:28

7 Answers7

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There could be many ways and it depends on the speaker. However, I always reply this way

Thank you. Same here. Or
Thank you. Nice talking to you as well

This conveys that your are thankful to the person. And you too feel the same.

Maulik V
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    +1 Definitely good for informal or casual, in my opinion. Although I would say 'Same here. Thank you.' –  Jan 04 '15 at 15:56
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    Sounds awkward to me - the 'thank you' starts off more formal, but then 'same here' isn't. I would just say "Yeah, you too!" – OJFord Jan 04 '15 at 23:03
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    I wonder if you ran into your ex-teacher and had a pleasant conversation with him or her, and before leaving your teacher said, "It was nice talking to you," would you reply your teacher with "Thank you. Same here."? – Damkerng T. Jan 05 '15 at 00:34
  • @DamkerngT. you can come with n number of possibilities to have someone telling me that! I'm afraid I cannot include all! When the question is general, I'd certainly answer in a general way. OP's straightforward question is 'how to respond' such sentence. It can come from anyone's mouth -right from a gf to a teacher and even a stranger! And yes, I'd certainly answer that way to my ex teacher and trust me, here, they'll still like my answer! :) – Maulik V Jan 05 '15 at 05:13
  • @OllieFord strangely, yeah sounds awkward to me over 'Thank you!* – Maulik V Jan 05 '15 at 05:14
  • -1 Just to show that I wasn't one of those who don't like your answer. ;-) – Damkerng T. Jan 05 '15 at 05:21
  • That's fine! @DamkerngT. My answer could have been the same even though you had downvoted! :) – Maulik V Jan 05 '15 at 05:22
  • -1 retracted after the demonstration. ;-) – Damkerng T. Jan 05 '15 at 05:23
  • "And yes, I'd certainly answer that way to my ex teacher and trust me, here, they'll still like my answer!" This is interesting. I think I was wrong about thinking that teachers could raise formality in your dialect. As for me, I always feel that replying my teachers with "Same here." (with or without "Thank you."), as you suggest, is quite impolite. – Damkerng T. Jan 05 '15 at 05:30
  • Maybe, but involuntarily, we'd add ... same here, sir/madam! And things change! @DamkerngT. – Maulik V Jan 05 '15 at 05:33
  • Then, you should say so in the first place. No need to wait for my comment before adding "Nice talking to you as well", or "sir" (or "madam", which is probably InE). My problem was that the question is about "politeness" and you suggested "However, I always reply this way" with the answer "Thank you. Same here.". Imagine what if the OP always used that after reading your answer. – Damkerng T. Jan 05 '15 at 05:38
  • @MaulikV AmE? Pretty common UK, in response to anything of the form "nice to see you", "see you later", etc. – OJFord Jan 05 '15 at 10:18
7

It was nice to talk to you.

My response might depend on exactly who I am talking with, but I can think of the following which I would say at least some of the time.

Note, since this is saying goodbye, or "leave-taking," it's okay to repeat the same words or use similar words (similar to greeting: A: How are you? B: Fine, and how are you?)

Polite:
-Yes, it was nice to talk with you too. (polite)
-Nice talking to you too. ("polite")
-I feel the same. [I hope we can do it again some time {polite}. Or Let's do it again sometime. {casual}] (polite, and definitely gets the point across; I mean you are admitting some feelings here)

Friendly:
-Same here. Nice talking with you.
-Yes, same here. I'll talk with you later. (but only if you mean it)
-Hey, it was great to talk with you too! (friendly/enthusiastic)
-Good chatting with you too!

Informal:
-Yes, catch you later! (more informal, use with a good or frequent chat buddy only)
-Yes, same here!* (pretty informal)*

If you are in a hurry:
-Me too. (I would probably not actually say this one, but 'me too' seems to be used more and more these days as a generic response, even if the logic doesn't work: A: It was good to see you again. B: Me too.) As a texted response, it would be okay with a friend.
-Okay, me too, see you!! (This one sounds better because 'me too' is not by itself.) But it does sound as if you are in a hurry to say good bye.

But not:
-I think so.

Last, apparently 'talk' or 'speak' to someone is British English, and 'talk' and 'speak' with someone is American English (generally speaking).

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  • I only ever talk to people, not talk "with" them. :-) But presumably both are allowed. Anyways, I will stick to the to preposition. Besides, "I'll talk with you later" on the phone sounds like bad grammar to my ears. "I'll talk to you later" - yes, perfect. – syntaxerror Jan 04 '15 at 18:04
  • @syntaxerror where do you live? Are you a native speaker? Please see http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/1029/is-there-any-difference-between-talk-to-someone-and-talk-with-someone and the other answer, linked from this one –  Jan 04 '15 at 19:30
  • Well, I'm not a native speaker, but I have this kinda sensor which recalls to my mind that I haven't ever heard a native speaker use "talk with", always only "talk to". Thanks for the link, will check it out now. – syntaxerror Jan 04 '15 at 20:48
  • You can use "talk with" in this case: "Come here son, I need to talk with you." – Riley Francisco Sep 04 '15 at 20:49
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On "It was nice to talk to you"

This is not an answer to this question. It provides evidence from a corpus (COCA) that is related to "It was nice to talk to you.", which is an issue raised by an ELL member, syntaxerror, that "It was nice talking to you." is more appropriate, and the choice between talking to or talking with was questioned.

Here are the results found in COCA using two searches [be] nice talking to|with you, and [be] nice to talk to|with you, grouped by the intended time.

In the present:

'S NICE TO TALK TO YOU      12  
'S NICE TALKING TO YOU      3   
'S NICE TO TALK WITH YOU    1
'S NICE TALKING WITH YOU    1

In the past:

BEEN NICE TALKING TO YOU    15  
WAS NICE TALKING TO YOU     13  
WAS NICE TALKING WITH YOU   1   
BEEN NICE TALKING WITH YOU  1   
WAS NICE TO TALK WITH YOU   1   
WAS NICE TO TALK TO YOU     1   
IS NICE TO TALK TO YOU      1   
BEEN NICE TO TALK TO YOU    1

From the data, we can draw a few conclusions:

  1. All possible choices (of to talk or talking, and of talk to or talk with) are acceptable (or at least can be said "in use").

  2. The use of to is indeed in favor (compared to with).

  3. When talking about a past event, talking to is the favored choice by most speakers. When talking in present tense, to talk to is the favored one.

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Damkerng T.
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  • Authors may put "talk to" in the mouths of paper people. TWYL. –  Jan 05 '15 at 01:30
  • I think there's also a distinction between talking about talking and what-you-say when you are talking to/with someone. There's a difference between "I need to talk with my lawyer about that" and "It was nice talking to you". (Also @CarSmack) – CoolHandLouis Jan 05 '15 at 11:54
  • Might be interesting to see results on http://corpus.byu.edu/soap. I just tried but the site is down. – CoolHandLouis Jan 05 '15 at 11:59
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In informal contexts, I'd be likely to reply with...

"Ditto!"
or perhaps
"Same here!"

But in formal contexts, I might say...

"The pleasure was all mine"

...which is a long-established "set phrase" for such situations. I imagine most of the estimated 11,500 written instances in that link will be in contexts where the person being addressed has just thanked the speaker for "entertaining" him in some way (a nice evening out, a dance, pleasant company, etc.)

I'm actually quite surprised to discover that the Google Books finds no instances before these two from 1900. It's still "current" today, but I thought it would be at least Victorian, if not earlier.

FumbleFingers
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  • To many ways to vary it, more results for "is all", or 'it' instead of pleasure, or simply "all mine" in response. – OJFord Jan 04 '15 at 23:07
  • @Ollie: I don't see why you say "too many variants". It's natural to use present tense in a greeting context ("How lovely to see you!", "The pleasure is all mine"), obviously. I'm not sure I can easily imagine contexts where you'd simply reply "All mine" - but if you think that's credible enough to mention, it just goes to show how much of a set phrase the complete version is. – FumbleFingers Jan 05 '15 at 13:57
  • I meant with regard to your book search - there are 'too' many variants to get many results with the specificity you searched. – OJFord Jan 06 '15 at 16:07
  • @Ollie: Well, I'd expect virtually every native speaker to be familiar with this "stock response" - I only included a link to show just how standard it is, for non-native speakers. Apart from the matter of present or past tense reflecting greeting/ongoing interaction as opposed to leave-taking contexts, there's not much variance. I wouldn't expect anyone to reply "It was all mine" if someone had just said "It was a pleasure to meet you", since that sets up a conflict between two different referents for "it". – FumbleFingers Jan 06 '15 at 18:37
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I say simply

You too.

Or

Thanks, you too.

Which means

(It was nice talking to) you too.

With respect to Maulik V's answer above, I'd say that "Same here" is a bit too informal in US English and could sound dismissive or rude if the speaker is not careful. However, I don't know much about Indian English, so it may be perfectly acceptable there.

oaker
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As a simple reply, you can use "The pleasure is mine".

Jones: It was nice talking to you.
Sam: Oh! The pleasure's mine.

I usually respond to such statements with something like that. If it feels a bit too formal, you can always just say "Same here" as Maulik suggested.

anotherDev
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0

I think the reply should be something like this:

And to you too...

Where "And" represents "it was nice talking".

Simply, it can be interpreted as

And (it was nice talking) to you too...

Nathan Tuggy
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