5 British English Phrases and Expressions You Need to Know!

Hello, this is Jack from tofluency.com.

Welcome to this English lesson where we're going to

look at five very British English phrases.

The following five phrases are also really common,

so let's get straight into number one.

Recently, there was a night where

I just couldn't get to sleep.

I was tossin' and turnin' in bed,

and then I finally decided to go downstairs

and do some work instead.

It got to about 2:00 a.m. before I finally got to sleep,

but my daughter woke up at 5:45 a.m.,

and when my wife got up at 8:00 a.m.,

I said to her, "I'm knackered.

"I'm knackered."

To be knackered means that you are really, really tired.

Not just a little bit tired but really tired.

So you'll hear people in the UK say, I'm knackered.

I'm going to bed.

Or if they've been working on a project all day,

I'm knackered.

Notice the emphasis here too.

I'm knackered.

I'm knackered.

So, use this phrase the next time

you're feelin' really tired.

(rock guitar music)

You probably already know the word

that people use when they're havin' a drink,

and they bring their glasses to the center.

They hit each other's glasses, and they say, cheers.

But you might not know that in the UK,

people also use this instead of thank you.

Your friend says, you're lookin' really good today.

Cheers.

You left your phone in the car,

and your friend passes it to you.

Cheers.

The queen gives you a really special present for Christmas.

Cheers.

No, not in this case.

You would never ever say cheers to the queen.

That's because cheers is a more informal way

of saying thank you.

There's also a phrasal verb with the word cheer,

which is cheer up,

and I made a lesson on this,

which you can find in the description.

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The next one is one of my favorites,

and it's using the word fancy.

Here's an example.

Do you fancy doin' somethin' tonight?

Do you fancy doing something tonight?

And this is like saying,

do you feel like doin' somethin' tonight?

Or do you want to do something tonight?

I used this a coupla weeks ago

because I sent a text to my wife sayin',

I really fancy Indian food tonight.

Again, this just means I feel like Indian food tonight.

I want to have Indian food tonight.

We ended up havin' something completely different.

Now, if you like somebody romantically

and you want to ask them out on a date,

the way to say this in the UK, or one of the ways,

I'm not an expert, is to say,

do you fancy goin' out for a drink sometime?

Do you fancy goin' out for a drink sometime?

Now, another way that British people

use the word fancy is fancy dress.

And to wear fancy dress means to wear a costume,

so people in the UK wear

fancy dress on Halloween.

And usually they'll find any reason to wear fancy dress,

so you might hear people in the UK say,

I fancy wearin' fancy dress tonight.

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I often get a smile from Americans when I say this next one,

and it's this: That's brilliant.

That's brilliant.

This means that's great, or that's fantastic.

For example, a friend tells you that they got a new job.

That's brilliant.

My son tells me that he got a special reward at school.

That's brilliant!

When my wife sent me video

of our daughter doing somethin' funny.

That's brilliant.

Again, this means that's great,

or that's amazin', or that's fantastic.

In America, you'll hear them say, that's awesome.

In fact, everythin' is awesome here.

People say this all the time.

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The last one might be a little bit rude to some people,

but it's not very strong, so here it is.

You might have heard the term bloody hell.

Bloody hell.

This is a way to express anger.

For example, bloody hell, you just stood on my foot.

Again, it's kinda rude but not very strong.

Now, we can also use bloody

to emphasize somethin'.

For example, it's bloody brilliant.

It's bloody brilliant,

which means it's really, really,

really, really, really good.

We can also use it to emphasize bad things too.

Imagine that I'm watchin' a football game,

and it's the worst game I've ever seen in my life.

I can say, this game is bloody awful.

This game is bloody awful.

And one thing that you will hear British people say

is this: The weather is bloody awful today.

The weather is bloody awful today.

Okay, so those were the five very British phrases.

I hope you have enjoyed this video.

If you have, then please like and share it.

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And for everyone who is watchin' this,

go check out my other videos here.

Thank you so much for watchin'.

(rock guitar music)

Cheers!