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I find myself these days saying 'cheers' all the time as a kind of mild form of 'thanks', and I heard it said a lot round here (Northamptonshire, England). It's not even a commoner thing, I'd say the middle class are likely to use it a lot. Is it used this way in the US, or would you always consider 'cheers' as something to say when toasting?

Jez
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3 Answers3

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No, Americans only use it as a toast, although we're aware that people from the UK and Australia use it as thanks or goodbye.

Jeanne Pindar
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    Some people use "Cheers" as thanks or goodbye but it is very rare. – WalterJ89 Feb 10 '11 at 13:14
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    @WalterJ89: and at least in some cases, it is a deliberately affected Britishism. – PLL Feb 10 '11 at 17:01
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    I've heard it used as a parting word here in the states. Dunno if it was just from transplanted Brits though (I know a few). Never noticed. – T.E.D. Jul 19 '11 at 12:23
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    I've heard it used as "goodbye", but not "thanks" (until I started watching Misfits). Recently, my husband asked me about an email from a colleague that ended in "cheers". He was actually offended by it for some reason. I asked if the sender was from the UK, he said yes, and I explained it was "normal". So many may not be aware, as your answer states. (We are in NYC, by the way — not some backwater.) –  Jul 29 '12 at 04:18
  • @user24205: I disagree that it would be typical for an English/British person to use the word to sign off an email. It definitely carries a sense of 'thanks' rather than 'farewell' in the UK. (Even though it's a common way to end a phone conversation, that seems to convey 'thanks for speaking with me'.) – Dodecaphone Apr 25 '16 at 22:12
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    Signing off with "cheers" is pretty common in my experience (I'm English). It's my standard sign-off in emails to friends, and that of many people that I know. I can also confirm that it's also commonly used to mean "thanks" here where, again, it's very informal. – Rupe Dec 10 '16 at 21:06
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Sometimes it is used now to mean "thanks" or "you're welcome" in addition to the toasting context. I live in America and it is catching on, most likely because of the Internet and how interconnected the world has become these days with travel and mobile phones, etc. For better or worse, sayings and distinctions that used to be regional or worldly locators for where a person was from or grew up is not necessarily the case anymore. YouTube, TV shows, movies, friends, travel, and the Internet, etc., can teach anyone anything these days.

Emily Alinder Flynn
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Some Americans will use "cheerio" to mean thanks or goodbye. But they are mainly "Anglo" Americans, or at least Americans who have spent some time in England.

Tom Au
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    Interesting. I'm not aware of "cheerio" ever being used to mean "thanks" in the UK. – Rupe Jul 10 '14 at 14:02
  • As @Rupe pointed out, "cheerio" is most commonly used for goodbye in the UK and I've never heard it used as a replacement for "thanks". – Frankie Dec 09 '16 at 20:29
  • @Frankie: I said ANGLO- Americans sometimes do this, not UK residents. – Tom Au Dec 09 '16 at 23:44
  • @TomAu thks pointing it out. I've misread it and obvious have no idea what Anglo-Americans say. – Frankie Dec 10 '16 at 04:32
  • @TomAu I don't think either Frankie or I intended any criticism. But you did say "..who have spent some time in England", from which people could easily infer that the UK was to some degree a source of this usage, and so a clarification was in order. And like I said, it's interesting that Anglo-Americans might use it to mean "thanks". – Rupe Dec 10 '16 at 21:03