"De nada" means (literally) that there's nothing to be thankful about. "No hay nada que agradecer".
It's semantically similar to "not at all", but it can also be correctly translated to "You're welcome".
Answer from cgc on Stack Exchange"De nada" means (literally) that there's nothing to be thankful about. "No hay nada que agradecer".
It's semantically similar to "not at all", but it can also be correctly translated to "You're welcome".
According to DLE in de nada it's a polite answer to thanks being given to somebody.
Basically it's kind of equivalent to it was nothing/think nothing of it/no problem/don't mention it.
In Spanish you can also say no fue nada (and in that sense that sounds more "complete"), por nada, no hay problema; so basically de nada and the other variants are the current short way of saying no hay de qué dar las gracias or no hay por qué dar las gracias.
I've been wondering this for a while, “de nada” literally means “of nothing”, but in the mind of a Spanish speaker, is that “of nothing” really how they feel?
In these Word Reference threads, "por nada", "por nada vs de nada", "No hay de que; de nada; por nada", almost everyone says it's the same expression and it depends on everyone's choice.
But in the second one, someone says "por nada" is regarded as kind of rude in Spain. I am not sure about this, but I can say that while studying Spanish (note: I learnt the one from Spain), I think I never heard "por nada" but just "de nada".
And looking up the RAE for the word "nada", you can see that only "de nada" is listed. So maybe, although this doesn't prove about it being rude, it shows it's apparently more spread in the other Spanish speaking countries in Central and South America than in Spain. Perhaps native speakers can confirm this.
De nada is usually used as a polite answer after Gracias. On the other side Por nada is used when you were working on something and you didn't have a result, so you were working for nothing. In my opinion, Por nada would be then impolite answer after Gracias!
Also, direct translate of the phrases would be:
De nada = You're welcome
Por nada = For nothing.
One of the first words that you learn is "gracias" which perfectly translates to "thank you". De instant reply that comes to your mind might be " de nada". But as always, native speakers apart from saying this, we use more alternatives. In a previous post (which later was removed), I showed you several ways to say Gracias. In this post, I'm going to tell you several ways to reply to that.
If you're more of a visual learner and want to see examples of use and also train your listening skills, my friend and I made a video that you can find right here.
Formal ways
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A la orden
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Es un placer ayudarle
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Con mucho gusto
Informal ways
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Ni lo menciones
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Para eso estamos
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No hay de qué
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Cuando quieras
The Mexican way
Edit: Note: only use it in very informal situations with friends and just for the lols.
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De nalgas
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No pasa nada
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No hay pedo
Let's make this list longer. Have you heard of another? Is there any other way in your country?
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