German to English Dictionary

False friends (falsche Freunde) are German words that look similar to English words but have completely different meanings. Classic examples: Gift (poison, not gift), bald (soon, not bald), Brand (fire, not brand), Handy (cell phone, not handy), sensibel (sensitive, not sensible), aktuell (current, not actual). Always double-check words that look like English — they may have very different meanings.

Every German noun has one of three genders: masculine (der), feminine (die), or neuter (das). Unlike in English, gender in German is grammatical, not natural — so "das Mädchen" (the girl) is neuter. Gender must generally be memorized with each noun. Some patterns help: nouns ending in -ung are always feminine; nouns ending in -chen or -lein are always neuter; many agent nouns ending in -er are masculine.

The most common German words are mostly function words: the articles (der, die, das, ein, eine), pronouns (ich, er, sie, es, wir), prepositions (in, auf, an, mit, von, zu), and conjunctions (und, aber, weil, wenn, oder). These grammatical words make up a large percentage of any German text. Mastering these 100 words gives you the structural foundation to understand most German writing.

Both translate to "to know" in English, but they're used differently. Wissen (wissen/weiß) is used for knowing facts, information, and answers: Ich weiß, wo er ist (I know where he is). Kennen is used for knowing people, places, and things through familiarity: Ich kenne Berlin gut (I know Berlin well). This distinction doesn't exist in English but is essential in German.

German compound words are formed by joining two or more words without spaces. The last word is the main noun (Grundwort) and determines the gender; preceding words modify it (Bestimmungswort). Example: Krankenhaus = krank (sick) + Haus (house) = hospital (das Krankenhaus). This allows German to create very precise vocabulary: Verschlimmbessern = to make something worse while trying to improve it.

Umgangssprachlich means "colloquial" or "informal" — it labels words and expressions that are used in casual spoken language but not in formal writing. In English dictionaries this is often marked as "informal" or "colloquial." For professional documents and formal writing, always use standard (non-colloquial) vocabulary.

Yes — "Anglicisms" (Anglizismen) are common in modern German, especially in business, technology, and youth culture. Examples: das Meeting (meeting), downloaden (to download), der Job (job), cool (cool), das Smartphone, chatten (to chat). German uses these English loanwords as-is but often gives them German inflections and capitalizes nouns.

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