كل سنة وأنت طيب
“كل سنة وأنت طيب” (куль сана ва-анта таийб) — happy birthday in Arabic. Phrase, level A1. Literally "a whole year — and may you be well": the Arabic wish formula. A long "happy birthday to you" an Arab will not say — he says this, and the cake has nothing to do with it. In a live sentence: “كل سنة وأنت طيب, صديقي” — Happy birthday, my friend. Written with the characters ك, ل, س, ن, ة, و, أ, ن, ت, ط, ي, ب.
In short
| Written in Arabic | كل سنة وأنت طيب |
| Read in Latin letters | куль сана ва-анта таийб |
| Translation | happy birthday |
| Part of speech | phrase |
| Level | A1 |
Why it looks that way
Literally "a whole year — and may you be well": the Arabic wish formula. A long "happy birthday to you" an Arab will not say — he says this, and the cake has nothing to do with it
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- كل سنة وأنت طيب, صديقيкуль сана ва-анта таийб, садийкиHappy birthday, my friend
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “happy birthday” in Arabic?
«كل سنة وأنت طيب», read “куль сана ва-анта таийб”. In a live sentence: “كل سنة وأنت طيب, صديقي” — Happy birthday, my friend. Phrase, level A1; written with the characters ك, ل, س, ن, ة, و, أ, ن, ت, ط, ي, ب.
How is “كل سنة وأنت طيب” written in Latin letters?
куль сана ва-анта таийб. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Literally "a whole year — and may you be well": the Arabic wish formula. A long "happy birthday to you" an Arab will not say — he says this, and the cake has nothing to do with it. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.