Log inSign up

¡Feliz cumpleaños, abuela!

¡Feliz cumpleaños, abuela!
Happy birthday, grandma!
From Lesson 146:Direct wishes (¡que...!)·Spanish (Latin America)

Breakdown of ¡Feliz cumpleaños, abuela!

la abuela
the grandmother
feliz cumpleaños
happy birthday

Questions & Answers about ¡Feliz cumpleaños, abuela!

Since this lesson is about using ¡Que... ! for wishes, why doesn't this sentence use it?
While you absolutely can say ¡Que tengas un feliz cumpleaños! (I hope you have a happy birthday) using the subjunctive, ¡Feliz cumpleaños! is a fixed, standalone greeting. Just like in English, we usually use the shorter version for standard celebrations rather than spelling out the whole verb phrase.
Why does cumpleaños end in an -s? Is it plural?
It's a compound word that literally means "completes years"! It combines the verb cumple (from cumplir, meaning to turn an age or complete) and the plural noun años (years). Even when talking about a single birthday, the word always keeps that -s at the end.
Does the adjective feliz change depending on the gender of the noun?
No, because feliz ends in a consonant (-z), it has the same form for masculine and feminine nouns. However, if the noun is plural, it does change! You swap the -z for a -c and add -es, making it felices, like in ¡Felices fiestas! (Happy Holidays!).
Could I say abuelita instead of abuela here?
Yes, absolutely! Abuela is perfectly natural and polite, but adding the diminutive ending -ita to make abuelita is very common in Latin America. It's used as an affectionate term of endearment, similar to "granny" or "grandma" in English.

Learn ¡Feliz cumpleaños, abuela and more in Spanish

All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.

  • ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
  • ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
  • ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free
Start learning Spanish →