English / German Cognates

This dictionary contains over 1800 words which are the same or nearly the same in English and German.  Such words are known as cognates.  Just like human family, not all are twins.  Some will be close, others only share a common etymology. It also contains a section of "fake friends" – words which one my think are cognates, but are not.  Some of these will get you in trouble, for example:  Gift does not mean something special for a friend, it means poison,  Use das Geschenk instead.

German is the most widely spoken and (co-) official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, South Tyrol (Italy), the German-speaking Community of Belgium, and Liechtenstein. It is also one of the three official languages of Luxembourg. German is the second most widely spoken Germanic language, after English.

One of the major languages of the world, German is the first language of almost 100 million people worldwide and the most widely spoken native language in the European Union.  Together with French, German is the second most commonly spoken foreign language in the EU after English, making it the second biggest language in the EU in terms of overall speakers.  German is also the second most widely taught foreign language in the EU after English at primary school level (but third after English and French at lower secondary level), the fourth most widely taught non-English language in the US (after Spanish, French and American Sign Language), and the second most commonly used scientific language as well as the third most widely used language on websites (after English and Russian).

The German-speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of annual publication of new books, with one tenth of all books (including e-books) in the world being published in the German language.   In the United Kingdom, German and French are the most-sought after foreign languages for businesses (with 49% and 50% of businesses identifying these two languages as the most useful, respectively).

This dictionary is derived from our Words R Us system.  We publish more than 100 bilingual dictionaries and phrasebooks.