Best Conversation Starters for Meeting Strangers

Like our recent page on mastering the art of talking to strangers, this page is used as a guide for you to help those chit-chats you have with people. Whether you are at the bar or you are at the park, you may meet someone and at Starleaf, we do understand that some people struggle with this and, a lot of us do too.

We want to help and one thing we left off the page we mentioned earlier is sports and hobbies in general. These are essentials for getting on with someone and finding what people enjoy can make you realize that you could get on or not.

Sports

This is arguably the best conversation piece you can bring up when you meet someone at a bar, especially at a sports bar. There are several directions you can take the conversation here, you can ask if they like sport as a whole, or you can ask specifics.

You can dive straight in and ask if they like your favorite sport, so for me, I would ask someone if they liked soccer/football. If they do then we already have something we talk about. Whether we are rival teams or completely separate, it already gives you questions to ask.

There are a few ways you can go with these questions and being able to have a wide variation of questions available will be a big help for you if you are struggling. Sometimes, depending on the age of the person I'm talking to, I will ask if they like betting on football, usually if they do you can ask them about big wins they have had and you can talk about yours.

This doesn't just end at soccer/football, there is a whole host of sports you may be interested in and finding people like you can make those dreaded first conversations a bit more bearable.

Music

There are certain things that everyone likes or should like and these next 2 things are that. Starting with music, it is one of the most universally loved things in the world and also one of the most influential. When you meet new people, finding things you can both bond over is essential and because music is so loved, you can hardly go wrong.

Now obviously, music is tricky because it is subjective and you can like some music that other people hate. This is one of the beautiful things about music and why it is such a good topic to bring up. Asking people about the music they like and asking for suggestions and giving suggestions could blossom a great friendship.

Movies and TV

This is similar to music in its subjectivity, people are completely turned off by the idea of movies and others love them; this always leads to fun conversations again and if you find someone who likes movies or TV shows you can talk about all of your favorites together. The beauty of music is the fact that you can easily listen to other people's favorites.

However, with movies and TV shows, you will need more time to divulge and listen to people's movie recommendations. This is great because you may be able to keep in contact with these people if you do end up watching what they recommend. But, on the other hand, it also means you will both need to find common ground for movies or shows you like.

Being able to find similarities between people and yourself is always a good step in finding new friends or talking to strangers. As we have said, we understand how scary introducing yourself to new people can be and we want to make this easier for you.