German 1000 most common word vocabulary: 1000 words
The 1000 most common everyday words, ranked by real-world usage — core vocabulary for real conversations (English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese). This page lists 40 of them with their German translations, then lets you practise the full set in either direction with spaced repetition.
English to German: the first 40 words
| English | German | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| like | mögen | To find something pleasurable or agreeable, not to compare. |
| time | Zeit | The ongoing passage of hours and days, as measured by clocks. |
| new | neu | Recently made or only just come into existence, the opposite of old. |
| people | Leute | Human beings in general, thought of as a group. |
| good | gut | Of high quality or morally right, the opposite of bad. |
| first | erste | Coming before all the others in order. |
| know | wissen | To be aware of a fact or have information, not to be acquainted with a person. |
| see | sehen | To perceive something with your eyes. |
| make | machen | To create or produce something. |
| think | denken | To turn ideas over in your mind. |
| want | wollen | To wish to have or do something. |
| way | Art | The manner or method in which something is done. |
| right | richtig | Correct or accurate, not the direction or a legal entitlement. |
| work | Arbeit | Effort spent at a job, usually to earn money. |
| year | Jahr | A period of twelve months. |
| day | Tag | A twenty-four hour period, or the bright hours between two nights. |
| take | nehmen | To grasp something and carry it away with you. |
| many | viele | A large number of countable things. |
| life | Leben | The state of being alive, from birth until death. |
| say | sagen | To speak words aloud to someone. |
| world | Welt | The Earth and everything and everyone on it. |
| great | groß | Very large in size or importance. |
| last | letzte | Final in sequence or duration, not to endure. |
| best | beste | Better than all the others. |
| love | lieben | To feel deep affection for someone or something. |
| man | Mann | An adult male human being, not a woman. |
| home | Zuhause | The place where you live and feel you belong. |
| long | lang | Measuring a lot from one end to the other, not short. |
| look | schauen | To direct your eyes deliberately, not to appear. |
| use | benutzen | To employ a tool or object for some purpose. |
| come | kommen | To move toward the speaker or arrive somewhere. |
| part | Teil | A piece or section of a larger whole. |
| state | Zustand | A condition or circumstance, not to say something. |
| three | drei | The number after two and before four. |
| better | besser | Of higher quality or more suitable than something else. |
| find | finden | To discover or locate something you were looking for. |
| help | helfen | To make someone's task easier by doing something for them. |
| high | hoch | Reaching far up from the ground. |
| little | klein | Small in size or amount. |
| old | alt | Having lived or existed for a long time. Not new. |
960 more words in the full “1000 Most Common Words” library, each aligned across seven languages and scheduled for you by spaced repetition. Add it to your account and start drilling English to German in one click.
What to watch out for in German
- 199 of these 1000 words are near-identical in English and German (20%) —
Team,Name,System. Those are free; the value of drilling is in the rest. - Accents count. Answers are graded accent-sensitively, so you need
äöüßÄÖÜ— LinguaSwap shows a one-tap keypad for them while you type. - Capitalisation counts. German nouns are capitalised, and answers in German are graded that way —
hausis notHaus. - 1000 words carry a usage note in the full library, for the cases where a direct translation would mislead you.
Practise German 1000 most common word vocabulary
Words come back just before you would forget them, and every language direction is tracked separately.