Greek customs and etiquette: what to know before you go

The short version: dress for a church rather than for the beach you walked from, never wave with your palm out and your fingers spread, take what is offered to you, and do not try to be efficient. Everything below is either one of those in detail, or a thing that surprises people.

One honest framing before the list. Greece is a country, not a village, and Athens on a Tuesday and a mountain hamlet on a feast day are not the same social occasion. Read what follows as the shape of the thing, and then read the room you are in.

Hello, and the small business of names

The greeting is warmer and closer than most northern European visitors expect. Handshakes are normal on first meeting, and once you know someone, two kisses on the cheek are the default among friends and often between men. Standing further back than the other person is the mistake foreigners actually make, and the fix is simply not to step back.

Greeks tend toward first names quickly, and you will hear kyrie or kyria with a first name rather than a surname, which sits somewhere between formal and friendly and has no clean English equivalent.

The words worth carrying are few. Kalimera before the afternoon, kalispera after it, parakalo for please and for you are welcome, efharisto for thank you, and yia sas as a general hello and goodbye. Nobody expects more than that, and the goodwill you buy with it is out of all proportion to the effort.

Name days, and why nobody mentioned a birthday

Most Greeks are named after a saint, and the saint has a day in the calendar. That day, the name day, is a real fixture of the social year, and for many people it is the bigger of the two occasions.

The mechanism is the part that catches visitors, because it inverts what you expect. The person having the name day is the one who hosts. They bring sweets to the office, they buy the round, they put on the table. You wish them chronia polla, which means many years, and you do not organise anything on their behalf.

Since the names are shared, the days are collective. On 15 August every Maria and Panagiotis in the country is celebrating at once, and on Saint George’s day the same happens again with a different set of names, which is one reason the Greek calendar feels busier than yours. Which days close a bank and which merely fill a taverna is a separate question, and it is on public holidays and what closes.

The gesture to unlearn before you land

This is the one thing on the page that can genuinely offend by accident.

An open palm pushed toward someone, fingers spread, is an insult in Greece. It is called the moutza, and it is not a mild one. The trouble is that it is also, in much of the world, how you wave at a friend across a square, how you say stop to a taxi, and how you show someone the number five.

The fix is small. Wave with your palm turned toward yourself, or with a raised hand rather than a pushed one. Count on your fingers with the palm in. Order five of something by saying five. It takes a day to rewire and then you never think about it again.

Two more signals worth being able to read rather than to make. A short upward tilt of the head, often with a small click of the tongue, means no, and to a visitor it reads exactly like yes. And the Greek word for yes is ne, which sounds like the English no. Between those two you can agree to something you meant to decline, so watch the head as well as the word.

Filoxenia: how to accept things properly

Filoxenia, hospitality toward the stranger, is the custom people write about most and explain least. What is useful is not the concept but the etiquette of being on the receiving end of it.

You will be given things. A small carafe at the end of a meal, a plate of fruit nobody ordered, a coffee in a shop where you were only asking directions. The reflex to refuse politely, or to insist on paying, is the wrong one here: it reads as a rebuff rather than as good manners. Take it, say efharisto, and enjoy it.

If you want to reciprocate, do it later and sideways rather than immediately and in cash. Come back the next evening. Buy something from the shop. Bring a small thing if you are invited to a house, sweets or a decent bottle rather than anything expensive enough to embarrass. What you should not do is try to settle the account, because there is not one.

The same instinct explains a lot of what happens at the table, which is the next thing.

At the table, where most of the real etiquette lives

Greek eating is communal by construction and the manners follow from that.

Dishes arrive when they are ready rather than in courses, they land in the middle, and everyone reaches. Ordering a plate for yourself and guarding it is the visible foreigner move. Order fewer things than you think and add more later, which is also how you avoid the over-ordering that ends in a table of untouched food.

Meals run long, and the long part is the point. The plates being cleared is not a signal to leave, and you will generally need to ask for the bill rather than wait for it, because bringing it unbidden would be rushing you out.

On paying, the usual practice is that one person settles the whole thing and the split happens later or not at all. Offering to split down the middle is not offensive, but it is not the local default, and if someone has invited you they have almost certainly decided already. Let them. What to leave on top of it is on tipping in Greece, and what to actually order is on Greek food and drink.

Dinner starts late. Nine in the evening is normal and ten is not unusual in summer, so a taverna at seven means an empty room and a kitchen that has not warmed up.

Churches and monasteries: dress for the door

Greek churches are working buildings rather than exhibits, and the dress expectation is the one rule that is enforced rather than hoped for.

Shoulders and knees covered, for everyone. No bare midriff, no beachwear, no walking in from the sand in a swimsuit and a wrap. Many of the busier churches and monasteries keep a box of wraps and skirts at the entrance for exactly this, which tells you how routinely people arrive unprepared. Monasteries are the stricter end: at some of them trousers on women are fine and at others a skirt is expected, and the only reliable method is to look at what is by the door. The monasteries at Meteora each keep their own rules and their own closed days, and the great pilgrimage church on Tinos is calm and open to visitors outside its peak, with the same expectation of covered shoulders and knees.

Inside, the rules are quieter. Keep your voice down and your phone away. Do not walk in front of someone who is praying, and do not photograph people at worship. Photography of the building itself is often fine and sometimes not, and the answer is to look for a sign or ask, rather than to shoot first. If a service is running, you can stay and watch from the back, and standing rather than sitting is normal.

Lighting a candle as a visitor is welcome and costs whatever you put in the box. Taking communion is not, and that line is worth knowing rather than crossing.

Smoking, and the gap between the law and the terrace

Greece has one of the strictest smoke-free regimes in the European Union. The European Commission lists Greece among the member states with a complete ban on smoking in enclosed public places, on public transport and in workplaces, with only limited exceptions.

What you will observe is not always that. Enforcement varies, and the outdoor terrace is where the country and the law negotiate: a covered, half-enclosed terrace in winter is a genuinely grey space and you will find smoke in it.

The etiquette that follows is simple in either direction. Indoors, do not, whatever the room looks like it is doing. Outdoors, ask the table next to you before you light up, and expect that in most places the answer is a shrug. If smoke is a problem for you, take the outside table upwind rather than the inside one, which is the reverse of the instinct you arrived with.

Time, noise and the afternoon

The Greek day has a shape, and running against it is the most common way visitors are quietly rude without knowing.

The middle of the afternoon is quiet time in residential areas and especially in villages. Loud music, drilling, shouting up a stairwell and mowing anything are all out of order then, and so is a phone call taken at volume on a balcony. The commercial version of the same rhythm, which shops shut when and why, is on siesta and opening hours.

Punctuality is soft for social arrangements and firm for anything with an engine. Being twenty minutes late to dinner at someone’s house is unremarkable. Being two minutes late for a ferry is a different category of event entirely, as Greek island ferries sets out at length.

What not to argue about

Three subjects are live in Greece in a way they are not elsewhere, and a visitor gains nothing by having a position on any of them: the naming dispute over Macedonia, relations with Turkey, and the Parthenon Marbles held in London. You will hear all three discussed with feeling.

The move is to listen and ask rather than to adjudicate, which is good manners anywhere and is simply more load-bearing here. The same goes for the economy and for politics generally: interest is welcome, verdicts are not.

One more that is not political. Ask before photographing people, especially older people, working fishermen and anyone in a church. A village is somebody’s street, not a set.

The whole thing in one line

Be a guest rather than a customer. That single reframing gets you through the church door dressed properly, keeps your palm turned the right way, stops you splitting the bill three ways at a table where someone has already decided, and makes the long dinner make sense.

Get that right and the rest of the country opens up in a way it does not for people who arrive in a hurry. Pick where to try it in our destinations.

Common questions

What are the main customs and etiquette rules in Greece?

Cover your shoulders and knees in churches and monasteries, never push an open palm toward someone (the moutza gesture is an insult), accept food and drink that is offered rather than refusing or insisting on paying, eat late and share the dishes in the middle of the table, and keep the middle of the afternoon quiet in residential areas. Indoors, smoking is banned by law.

What is considered rude in Greece?

Showing an open palm with spread fingers, arriving at a church in beachwear, photographing people at worship without asking, being loud during the quiet hours of the afternoon, and refusing hospitality outright. Trying to pay for something a host has already decided to cover reads as a rebuff rather than as politeness.

Do you tip in Greece?

Yes, though modestly and by rounding up rather than by a fixed calculation, and it varies by the kind of place. The practice differs between tavernas, cafes, taxis and hotels, and it is set out properly in tipping in Greece rather than reduced to a percentage here.

What should you wear to visit a Greek church or monastery?

Shoulders and knees covered, for both men and women, with no beachwear and no bare midriff. Many churches and monasteries keep wraps and skirts at the entrance for visitors who arrive unprepared. Monasteries are stricter than parish churches, and some expect a skirt rather than trousers, so look at what is provided at the door before you walk in.

Is smoking allowed in restaurants and bars in Greece?

Not indoors. The European Commission lists Greece among the EU countries with a complete ban on smoking in enclosed public places, on public transport and in workplaces, with only limited exceptions. Outdoor and terrace seating is where you will meet smoke, and a half-enclosed winter terrace is the grey area in practice.

What is a Greek name day and what do I do?

It is the feast day of the saint a person is named after, and for many Greeks it matters more than a birthday. Wish them chronia polla, which means many years. The person celebrating is the one who hosts and pays, so expect to be given something rather than to give it, and do not arrange anything on their behalf.

How do Greeks say yes and no?

Ne means yes, which is the trap, because it sounds like the English no. For no, watch for a short upward tilt of the head, often with a small tongue click, which reads to visitors like a nod of agreement. Ochi is the spoken no. When in doubt, read the head rather than the word.