Restaurant reservations (Advanced): Number of guests

💬 Quante changes to match a plural noun, so with persone you get quante persone. The same pattern works in Quanti adulti? and Quanti bambini?

💬 Italian gives a group's size with in plus the number: siamo in quattro "there are four of us". Saremo is "we will be", which suits a booking.

💬 Altri "other" comes before the number, where English puts "more" after it. With feminine nouns it becomes altre: altre tre persone "three more people".

💬 Italian often uses the present tense for something that may happen soon. Si aggiungono literally means "join", but it reads as "will join".

💬 Italian needs lo "it" here, where English just says "I'll know". The same habit shows up in lo so "I know".

💬 Italian uses no word for "on" before a day. Venerdì alone means "on Friday".

💬 Libero means free as in available, not free of charge. For no cost, Italians say gratis.

💬 Da plus a number gives a table's size: un tavolo da quattro "a table for four". Use per when you mean the people themselves: per sei.

💬 Le is the polite "to you", and it sticks onto the end of the verb: confermare + le. The pattern works with other verbs too: dirle "to tell you".

💬 The ri- at the start means "again" or "back": chiamare "to call", richiamare "to call back". Mi richiami is the polite form you'd use with a stranger.

💬 Entro means "by" in the sense of "no later than": entro domani "by tomorrow".

💬 Putting il before a day turns it into a habit: il sabato means every Saturday. Sabato alone means this coming Saturday.

💬 A shortened senza altro, literally "without anything else". It's a fixed, warm way of saying "of course".

💬 After se "if" in a what-if situation, "we were" becomes fossimo instead of the everyday eravamo. It pairs naturally with a "would" answer such as ci sarebbe.

🇮🇹 Asking with "would there be" instead of "is there" makes the request sound tentative and courteous. It's the natural tone for asking a restaurant to bend a little.

💬 Basta plus an action means "all you need to do is…": basta chiamare "just call". The ci "us" sticks onto the end of the verb.

💬 Italian links two nouns with di where English just puts them side by side, so it's literally "number of telephone." Same pattern: numero di cellulare "mobile number."

💬 lascia is the polite "you" form, which looks just like the "he/she" form. With a friend it would be Mi lasci...?.

🇮🇹 Italians read phone numbers in small chunks, often in pairs or triplets, like tre quattro sette "three four seven." A number starting with 3 is a mobile, which is what restaurants usually expect.

💬 Give a range with da "from" ... a "to". Swap in any numbers: da due a quattro persone.

💬 aspetto already means "I wait for," so there's no extra word for "for." Same with Aspetto il conto "I'm waiting for the bill."

💬 Literally "a thousand thanks": mille "thousand" never changes form here.

💬 Adding -issimo to an adjective means "very." Say gentilissima to a woman, and bellissimo means "very beautiful."

💬 buona goes with feminine words. Before most masculine words it shortens to buon, as in buon pranzo "enjoy your lunch."

💬 serata is the evening as a stretch of time, while sera "evening" is the time of day. The -ata ending works the same way in giornata "the whole day."

🇮🇹 Say buona serata when leaving or hanging up, wishing someone a good evening ahead. buonasera "good evening" is the greeting you use on arrival.