Friendsgiving Toast: What to Say, With 5 Examples

The short version: a Friendsgiving toast runs 30 to 90 seconds and usually comes from the host or the friend who started the tradition, once every dish has landed and everyone has a glass. Say why you're talking, tell one specific thing about this group, make room for the new faces, and raise your glass. Five short toasts you can borrow from are below.

A family Thanksgiving toast is talking to people who have known each other forever. A Friendsgiving toast is talking to a group that chose to be in the room. Some of them have known each other for ten years. Some met tonight. Somebody brought a date who is still figuring out which one is Alex and which one is Sam.

That changes what a good toast does. At a family table, the toast mostly confirms what everyone already knows. At a friends' table, it can do something more useful: tell the group who it is. Where it started, what it's like, and that the new people are part of it now.

It still has to be short. People are holding plates.

Who gives the Friendsgiving toast, and when

Usually the host. You cleaned the apartment, you found enough forks, you get the first word. If the tradition was started by someone else, that person is the other natural choice, and in some groups the founder gives the toast every year no matter whose place it's at.

If neither of you wants to do it, ask a regular a day or two ahead. Don't hand it to someone at the table with everyone watching. That works with family because they have to forgive you. Friends will forgive you too, but the toast will be worse.

The timing is a little different from a family dinner, because a potluck arrives in pieces.

The one rule: wait for the latecomer. Every friend group has one, and if you toast before they arrive, they'll be the person who drove across town with the gravy and missed the only nice thing anyone said.

How Friendsgiving is different from family Thanksgiving

The basic shape is the same as any Thanksgiving toast. A few things about a friends' table are worth knowing before you write yours.

It's chosen family. Nobody is here because they have to be. That's the point of the night, and the toast can say it without getting sappy, as long as you say it with a detail instead of a slogan.

A lot of people are far from home. Some couldn't afford the flight. Some couldn't get the days off. Some aren't going home for reasons they don't want to explain at dinner. A good toast acknowledges that this table matters partly because another table is far away, and doesn't ask anyone why.

There are new people. Plus-ones, new roommates, a coworker someone invited at the last minute. They don't know the stories, and they're working hard to look relaxed. The toast is the easiest moment of the night to make them feel like they're in.

The food is chaos. Three mac and cheeses, no vegetables, a store-bought pie someone moved to a real pie dish. That's part of the fun, and it's a safe place for a joke because everyone contributed to the problem.

The space is usually small. Folding tables, people on the floor, a kitchen nobody can turn around in. Everyone can see it, which makes it good material.

A simple structure

1. Why you're talking. One line. "I'm hosting, so I get one minute." Or, "I started this thing six years ago, so this is my fault."
2. One true thing about this group or this year. The origin story, a moment from tonight, something about the room you're all in. Pick one.
3. The new people. A sentence that welcomes them by name, if there are only a few, or as a group, if there are more.
4. The glass. "Raise whatever you've got," then a short last line that calls back to your detail.

Here's the skeleton:

"I'm hosting, so I get one minute before we eat. [One thing about this group or this year.] [A line for the new people.] Everybody, raise whatever you've got. To [the callback]."

If that feels thin, use the free toast writer. It asks a few questions about your group and gives you a draft built around your own details.

Making room for the new people at the table

This is the part most Friendsgiving toasts forget, and it's the part the new people will remember.

• Say their names. If there are two or three new faces, name them. "Rafa, Lin, welcome. You picked a good year." It takes five seconds.
• Don't explain the inside jokes. Retire them for one night. If the toast needs a backstory to land, it's the wrong toast for a table with strangers.
• Give them a way in. A one-line guide to the group, a story from the first year, a rule of the house. Something that lets them know what they've walked into.
• Don't put them on the spot. Never ask a new person to say a few words, or what they're thankful for, with everyone looking at them.
• Don't make the couple the story. "So this is the famous Jordan" is a lot for Jordan. Welcome them the same way you'd welcome anyone else.

The second example below is built entirely around this. It works for any group that's grown a bit since last year.

Teasing without leaving anyone out

Friends tease each other, and a Friendsgiving toast with no laugh in it can feel stiff. A few rules keep it friendly:

• Tease the whole group, or tease yourself. The potluck that produced five desserts and one vegetable is everyone's fault. Your own cooking is fair game.
• If you single someone out, pick a habit they'd own. The friend who is always late, the one who brings the same dish every year. Not their love life, their job, their weight, or their family.
• Spread it around. If you're going to tease people, tease several, so nobody feels picked on. Include yourself.
• Check the joke for a backstory. If a new person would need three years of context to get it, cut it.
• Never tease someone who couldn't be here. They can't laugh along, and it reads as a dig.

For more on keeping a holiday toast funny, the funny Thanksgiving toast guide has the full set of rules, and there's a funny Friendsgiving toast from a guest if you want to see one built on potluck chaos.

The first Friendsgiving

The first one has no history yet, so don't pretend it does. Talk about tonight. The thing everyone can see right now: the borrowed chairs, the size of the kitchen, the fact that half the people at the table met this year. Then say plainly that you hope this becomes a thing.

Keep it shorter than you think. Nobody expects a big speech at a dinner that started as a group text two weeks ago.

A group that's done it for ten years

Long-running groups have the opposite problem. There's too much history, and the toast can turn into a list of every year. Pick one story, and the origin story is usually the best one. How it started is something the old members love hearing again and the new members have never heard.

Then turn to the people who've joined since. A ten-year Friendsgiving is a group that kept letting people in. Say so.

What to skip

• "Why aren't you home?" Never in a toast. Some people at the table had a hard reason, and it isn't yours to bring up.
• Family complaints. "At least we don't have to deal with our parents" gets a laugh from some people and lands badly on someone who would give a lot to be at their parents' table.
• Relationship updates. No "maybe next year Sam will bring someone." No "these two finally figured it out."
• Inside jokes. If four people laugh and the plus-ones smile politely, it didn't work.
• Politics. Even at a table where you're sure everyone agrees. You're wrong about one person.
• A gratitude list. One thing, said well, beats a list of eight.
• Stock lines. "Friends are the family we choose" is true and everyone has seen it on a sign. Say what this group actually did. The cliché detector will catch the worst ones.

If someone in the group has had a death or a hard loss this year, the guide to a Thanksgiving toast after a loss covers how to mention it without turning the night. If your group says grace before eating, the Thanksgiving grace guide has short versions that work at a mixed table.

5 Friendsgiving toasts

Names and details are placeholders. Timings assume about 130 words a minute. Keep the shape and swap in your own detail.

For the host at a first Friendsgiving (about 1 minute)

Okay, before anybody reaches for the stuffing. This is the first time we've done this, so the host gets the first toast.

I want to point out the chairs. I own two. That one is Bronwen's desk chair, which she rolled here four blocks, on the sidewalk, in the dark. Teodor brought the stool from his bathroom. Ines is sitting on a milk crate with a pillow on it, and she says it's fine, and her face says something else.

Every seat at this table came from a different apartment. A year ago, half of us hadn't met. Now we've got each other's furniture.

I hope we do this again next year. Raise your glass. To the first one, and to whoever has to roll that chair home.

Why it works: it has no history to lean on, so it uses something everyone can see right now, and the last line is about tonight's mess.

For the host when there are new people at the table (about 65 seconds)

We have three new people at the table this year, so I promised them a guide to everyone else. One line each. Nobody gets two.

Rosalind will tell you she doesn't want pie and then eat the most pie. Bram has strong opinions about stuffing, and they're wrong. Yusra has been about to quit her job since the day we met. Kofi organizes everything, and if he gives you a job tonight, just do it. It saves time. And I'm the one who said dinner was at six and put the turkey in at a quarter to five.

Aurelio, Thandiwe, Wynn, that's us. You've been warned, and you came anyway, which tells me you'll fit right in.

So raise whatever you've got. To the new people, who now know everything, and to dinner, which will be ready at some point.

Why it works: everyone gets teased, including the host, so the new people get the inside story without anyone being the target.

For the founder of a group that's done it for ten years (about 70 seconds)

Ten years ago, Dagmar taped a note inside the elevator of her building. It said, "Not going home for Thanksgiving? Neither am I. 4B, Thursday, bring a chair."

Three people came. One of them was a man from the sixth floor who brought a whole pot of gumbo, ate one bowl, and left before dessert. None of us ever saw him again. The other two were me and Tadeusz. So that's how this started. A note in an elevator and a stranger's gumbo.

Since then we've had four apartments, two weddings between people who met at this table, and at least one year where the turkey went back in the oven twice. Dagmar, you've hosted every single one. You still have the note. It's on your fridge.

If this is your first year, you're in it now. Raise your glass. To Dagmar, to 4B, and to the gumbo man, wherever he is.

Why it works: the origin story is new to the newcomers and a favorite of the regulars, and the last line keeps a funny detail from year one alive.

For the host of a very small apartment (about 45 seconds)

Quick toast, and I'm doing it sitting down, because there's nowhere to stand.

My apartment is small. Most of you are sitting on my bed. The sweet potatoes are on the ironing board, which is the buffet tonight, and if you lean on it, it folds, so please don't lean on the buffet. Somebody's coat is in the shower.

There are eleven of you in a place built for one person and a medium plant. Thank you for fitting. Glasses up. To the ironing board, which is doing its very best.

Why it works: the joke is about the apartment, which the host owns, and the thank-you lands on the guests for squeezing in.

For a guest thanking the host (about 35 seconds)

I'm not the host. I'm just the one who's had Radek's pie dish since last year. I brought it back tonight, with a pie in it, so we're even.

That's how this group works. Every year we all go home with somebody else's dish, and every year we come back to return it.

Delphine, thank you for having us again. Everybody, raise your glass. To our host, and to everyone leaving tonight with a dish that isn't theirs.

Why it works: one small habit of the group explains why everyone keeps coming back, and the host gets the thanks without a speech about it.

For longer versions, see the heartfelt Friendsgiving toast from a host and the toast for friends who can't fly home, or browse all the Thanksgiving toast examples. If you just need a line or two, try the Thanksgiving toast one-liners.

Delivering it

• Get everyone's attention once. "Can I have one minute," then wait. Don't tap a glass five times in a small apartment.
• Stand if you can, sit if you can't. In a tiny place, sitting is fine and sometimes the only option.
• Wait for the kitchen. Make sure whoever is pulling something out of the oven is in the room.
• Hold your phone or a card. Nobody minds. Memorize the first line and the last.
• Time it. Read it out loud with a timer, or paste it into the speech length calculator. Anything past ninety seconds, cut. You can also practice it out loud a couple of times before people arrive.
• Sit down after the last line. The glass going up is the ending.

If you're also going to a family Thanksgiving this year, the family Thanksgiving toast guide covers new partners at the table, blended families, and the first holiday after a loss.