How's it going?
The safest informal greeting in English — warmer than “How are you?”, safer than “What's up?”. The forms, the compression to “how-zit-GO-in”, the dummy it, five distinct uses from greeting to genuine check-in, the reply for each, the regional versions, the «нормально» trap, four dialogues, and a quiz.
When you need this
This is the greeting to default to. It's warmer than How are you?, safer than What's up?, and it works with almost anyone you have spoken to before — colleagues, clients, the barista, your landlord.
It is also five different speech acts wearing one set of words. Four of them are easy; the fifth — someone genuinely asking whether you are okay — is the one worth learning to hear.
- You need one informal greeting that is safe almost everywhere. This is it.
- Someone greets you with it and you have a second to reply.
- A colleague asks it while you're clearly mid-task — that's a real question about the task.
- It arrives slowly, with eye contact, after a hard week — that's a real question about you.
- You want to reopen a conversation that has gone quiet.
The forms
All the same expression, at descending levels of formality.
- How is it going? — never said — it has to be contracted
- How's it going? — the standard form; safe almost everywhere
- How's it goin'? — the same thing, written the way it is actually said
- Howzit going? — fully compressed, very casual
- Howzit? — South African English — a complete greeting on its own
- How goes it? — jokey, arch, deliberately old-fashioned
- How's it going with you? — slightly more attentive — invites a real answer
Pronunciation
/haʊz ɪt ˈɡəʊɪŋ/ — "how-zit-GO-in"
In real speech it compresses hard. Four written words, two spoken beats.
- *One stress, on go.* Everything before it is unstressed and runs together.
- The \
t\of it links straight into the vowel: how-zit is one chunk. - The -ing usually reduces to /ɪn/ — "goin'". This is normal speech, not sloppiness.
- Nothing is fully pronounced except the stressed syllable. If you can hear four separate words, it is too slow.
"How IS IT GOING" with three stresses is the classic learner delivery — it sounds robotic and slightly interrogating. If you can't compress it, use "How are you?" instead, which survives being said slowly.
The grammar behind it
Learners try to work out what it refers to, and there is no answer. It is a dummy subject — a placeholder that fills the subject slot because an English sentence requires one.
- It's raining. · It's late. · It's no use arguing. · How's it going?
- In every one of those, it points at nothing. It is grammatical scaffolding, not a pronoun with a referent.
- So "What is going?" has no answer — the question is not about a thing that goes.
Ukrainian and Russian do not need a subject at all: «Іде дощ» / «Идёт дождь» is a complete sentence with none. English cannot do that, so it invents one. That structural gap is exactly why this phrase feels odd at first — and why "What is going?" is such a natural instinct.
What it actually means
A greeting
The most common use. Not a question — a phatic expression, whose job is social contact rather than information.
- "Hey, how's it going?" — "Good, you?" — "Yeah, not bad."
- "Hi Sarah, how's it going?" — "Good thanks, you?"
It is the first thing said. Light intonation, quick delivery, speaker already moving on.
A real question about a task
Same words, with the referent supplied by context: the thing we both know you are working on.
- "How's it going?" — "Slowly. The migration keeps timing out on the big table."
- "How's it going?" — "Almost done — just testing now."
You are already in conversation, they know what you are working on, the delivery is slower with falling intonation. Often mid-morning or late afternoon, not at the start of the day.
With a complement — always real
Adding anything after going removes the ambiguity completely.
- "How's it going with the client?"
- "How's it going with the new apartment?"
- "How's it going over there?" — to a remote team
If a complement follows, it is a genuine enquiry and expects a substantive answer. No exceptions.
Checking in on you
The same words as the greeting, an entirely different act — and the one learners miss.
- "Hey… how's it going?" — "Honestly? Not great. It's been a long week."
Slow delivery, eye contact, a pause before it, and a known difficulty behind it — a bereavement, a layoff, an illness, a bad week. The markers are pace and context, never vocabulary.
A conversation restart
Used mid-conversation to reopen after a lull or a finished topic.
- "So — how's it going, generally?"
- "Anyway. How's everything going?"
Marked by so, anyway or generally, which signal a deliberate reset rather than a greeting.
Register ladder
The same move at four levels of formality. Pick the rung, not the phrase.
Casual
Friends, teammates you know well, Slack banter.
- "How's it goin'?"
- "Alright?" — British
- "Howzit?" — South African
- "What's up?" / "Sup?"
Friends, gym, gaming, teammates you know well. Alright? and Howzit? are regional and expect only the same back.
Neutral
The default at work — standups, most Slack, most email.
- "How's it going?"
- "How are things?"
- "How's everything?"
The rung to live on. Colleagues, standups, Slack, any client you have spoken to before. This is the phrase's home.
Professional
Clients, other teams, anyone senior, anything on the record.
- "Hi Sarah, how are you?"
- "Hi — how's it going?" with a name attached
- "Morning. How was your weekend?"
A first call with a new client, someone senior, anything being recorded. Adding the person's name lifts the register enough to make it safe.
Formal
Contracts, complaints, first contact, legal and HR.
- "Good morning."
- "Nice to meet you."
- "I hope you're doing well." — in writing
First meetings, formal introductions, and all written English. How's it going? does not belong in any of these.
Channel variants
The register holds; the length changes. A call gets a sentence, an email gets a paragraph.
Call
- "Hi Sarah, how's it going?" — "Good thanks, you?"
- "All good. Thanks for making the time — shall we get started?"
One exchange, then business. The greeting is a handshake, and holding it longer feels like stalling.
Standup
- "Morning — how's it going?"
- "How's it going with the migration?" — for an actual status
Both uses live here, which is why standups are where the ambiguity bites. Add the complement when you want a real answer.
Slack
- "hey, how's it going?"
- "how's it going with the deploy? no rush"
Lowercase is normal. Attach the topic if you want an answer — a bare "how's it going" in a DM reads as a preamble to a request, and people brace for it.
- "Hi Sarah,"
- "Hope you're doing well."
- "Hope your week is going well."
⚠️ Not in email. It is spoken English; in writing it reads as too casual even to friendly clients. "Hope you're doing well" is the written equivalent.
In person
- "Hey, how's it going?" — with a nod, in passing
- "Hey. How's it going?" — slower, if you mean it
The only channel where the same four words can be either the greeting or the real check-in, decided entirely by pace.
The reply side
Half of any situation is what you say back.
- "Good, you?" ← the default
- "Good, thanks — you?" · "Not bad, you?" · "Yeah, good."
- "Pretty good, thanks." · "All good."
- "Fine, thanks. And you?" — more formal
- "Can't complain." (wry) · "Same old." (casual) · "Surviving." (jokey)
- "Yeah, alright." — British, neutral to flat
- "How's it going?" — mirroring it back is completely acceptable
- "Getting there."
- "Slowly, but it's moving."
- "Almost done — just testing now."
- "Not great, honestly. I'm stuck on the auth flow."
- "Better than yesterday."
- "Honestly? Not great. It's been a long week."
- "Yeah — I'm okay. Thanks for asking."
- "Do you have five minutes?" — if you do want to talk
- "Yeah good — the migration's nearly done." — answers both readings at once
- "All good, thanks. You?"
Neighbours
- How are you? — one rung more formal, and safe absolutely everywhere
- How are things? — same register, slightly warmer
- How's everything? — same register; often invites a bit more of an answer
- How have you been? — for someone you have not seen in a while — expects real news
- Hope you're doing well — the written equivalent; email only
- What's up? / Sup? — a rung lower — too casual for clients
- How do you do? — ⚠️ archaic. Learners reach for it to be polite and it lands as a period drama
- How's it hanging? — crude; same dummy it, entirely different room
Regional variation
- British — extremely common, often with flat non-questioning intonation. Local competitor: "Y'alright?"
- American — equally common. "How's it going?" and "How you doing?" are near-identical in frequency
- Irish — standard, alongside "What's the story?" and "How's things?"
- Australian — "How ya going?" — note going, not doing. This reliably confuses Americans
- South African — "Howzit?" is a complete greeting; the expected reply is "Howzit" back
- Canadian — "How's it goin', eh?" is real, but rarer than the stereotype suggests
Traps for Ukrainian and Russian speakers
- ❌ "What is going?"
- ✅ (the question has no literal answer)
- The literal parse. It is a dummy subject and refers to nothing — see the grammar part above.
- ❌ "Normal."
- ✅ "Not bad." / "All good."
- A direct calque of «нормально». In English normal as a reply sounds cold, evasive, almost clinical — and it is one of the most recognisable Slavic-speaker markers there is.
- ❌ "Fine."
- ✅ "Fine, thanks — you?"
- A bare Fine signals that something is wrong. Always add thanks and bounce it back.
- ❌ "I am fine, thank you, and you?"
- ✅ "Good, thanks — you?"
- Grammatically perfect and unmistakably textbook. The contraction and the short form are what make it sound native.
- ❌ "Going good."
- ✅ "Going well." / just "Good."
- Good is an adjective; modifying going needs the adverb. "Good" alone as a whole reply is fine — it is short for "It's good".
- ❌ "How is it going?"
- ✅ "How's it going?"
- It has to be contracted. The full form is never said.
- Answering with real news. «Як справи?» can invite an actual answer; this usually does not. "Good, you?" is correct even on a terrible day.
- Missing the serious version — slow delivery, eye contact, after bad news. Answering a bright "Good, you?" is a small social miss.
- Avoiding it with clients out of caution and reaching for How do you do? instead, which is far worse. "How's it going?" is fine with any client you have spoken to before.
Mini dialogues
Two short exchanges — read them aloud once each.
- A: Hey, how's it going?
- B: Good, you?
- A: Yeah, not bad. Ready for the call?
- A: How's it going?
- B: Slowly. The migration keeps timing out on the big table.
- A: Want a second pair of eyes?
- A: Hey… how's it going?
- B: Honestly? Not great. It's been a long week.
- A: Want to talk about it?
- A: Hi Sarah, how's it going?
- B: Good thanks, you?
- A: All good. Thanks for making the time — shall we get started?
Don't say this
- ❌ "How is it going?" — uncontracted; nobody says it that way.
- ❌ "What is going?" — the literal parse of a phrase that has no literal answer.
- ❌ "Normal." — a calque of «нормально» — reads as cold or evasive.
- ❌ "Fine." — on its own it signals that something is wrong.
- ❌ "I am fine, thank you, and you?" — textbook English; correct and instantly recognisable as learned.
- ❌ "Going good." — needs the adverb — "going well".
- ❌ "How's it going?" — in a formal email, or at a first formal meeting. Use "Hope you're doing well" or "Nice to meet you".
- ❌ "How do you do?" — archaic. It is not the safe formal option learners think it is.
Practice
Choose the better option for each prompt.
1.Someone greets you with "How's it going?" — the all-purpose reply is:
2.The reply that sounds cold and evasive to a native ear:
3.The reply that signals something is wrong:
4.The email-safe written equivalent:
5.Said slowly with eye contact after you've been quiet all morning, it means:
6.Grammatically perfect but unmistakably textbook: