How to say
kòp-kun
thank you
Thank you in Thai is ขอบคุณ, said kòp-kun. Add ครับ (kráp) on the end if you are male or ค่ะ (kâ) if you are female, which is what makes it polite rather than blunt.
The ending is chosen by your own gender, not the gender of the person you are thanking, and it does not change.
| Syllable | Sounds like | Tone |
|---|---|---|
| ขอบ | kòp | low tone low tone |
| คุณ | kun | mid tone mid tone |
Step down onto the first syllable and hold the second flat. Do not lift the end the way an English speaker naturally would — that is a rising tone, and it is a different shape from the one Thai ears are listening for.
Each of these is a word in its own right, so it is worth hearing them apart before you hear them joined.
This is the part that confuses people first, so it is worth getting straight before anything else. ครับ and ค่ะ are politeness particles. They carry no meaning of their own. You stick one on the end of almost anything to make it polite, and which one you use is decided by your own gender, not by who you are talking to.
A man says ครับ to everyone. A woman says ค่ะ to everyone. A man thanking his wife still says ขอบคุณครับ. It never switches.
There is one wrinkle worth knowing. Women use ค่ะ (falling tone) on statements, but คะ (high tone) on questions. Men use ครับ for both. Nobody will mind if you get this wrong, and you will pick it up by ear faster than by rule.
Bare ขอบคุณ is not an insult. It lands roughly the way "thanks" does when you meant "thank you very much" — fine between friends, noticeably curt to a stranger, and slightly odd from a foreigner who has clearly learned the phrase from somewhere.
Adding the particle costs one syllable and is the single cheapest way to sound like someone who has bothered. Use it.
มาก means "much" or "a lot", so ขอบคุณมาก is "thank you very much". It is warmer, not more formal, and it fits when someone has actually gone out of their way. For handing you change or passing you a menu, plain ขอบคุณ with a particle is the right size.
Two, in fact. The first is the tones. ขอบ is a low tone and คุณ is a mid tone, so the phrase steps down and then sits flat. English speakers reading kob-kun off a page tend to put an English stress pattern on it and lift the second syllable, which is a tone Thai listeners have to work around rather than hear.
The second is thanking too much. British English thanks people constantly — for handing over a receipt, for holding a door, for existing nearby. Thai does not, and a stream of ขอบคุณ for small transactional things reads as slightly strange rather than polite. Save it for when someone has done something.
ไม่เป็นไร — mai pen rai. Literally "it is nothing", and it covers "you're welcome", "no problem", "don't mention it" and "never mind" all at once. It is one of the most useful phrases in the language and does far more work than the textbook translation suggests.
Both, depending on who is speaking. A man says kòp-kun kráp and a woman says kòp-kun kâ. The word for thank you is the same either way — only the politeness particle on the end changes, and it is chosen by the speaker's gender rather than the listener's.
Yes, and it will be understood, but it lands the way "thanks" does when "thank you" was expected. Adding krap or ka costs one syllable and is the difference between sounding curt and sounding like someone who has made an effort.
Mai pen rai (ไม่เป็นไร). It covers "you're welcome", "no problem" and "never mind", and it is one of the most useful phrases in the language.
Low then mid. ขอบ is a low tone and คุณ is a mid tone, so the phrase steps down and stays flat. The common English-speaker error is lifting the second syllable, which turns it into a rising tone.