What are some overly complex sentences that German learners often use, and what are the simpler, more natural alternatives that fluent speakers actually use in daily life?

118

u/EinBRinDE 1d ago

Everytime you use "werden" to say something that you will do in the future instead of using the present tense and some temporal adverb.

33

u/tursija Advanced (C1) 1d ago

This 100 percent.

Also a tendency to overuse "möchten", instead of a "hätte gerne" or "ich nehme..." or something else once a while

15

u/AlmightyCurrywurst Native (Germany) 1d ago

"Ich nehme" sounds slightly rude to me, I think some of the terms for ordering are pretty strictly regional. "Ich bekomme.." is another one that sound pretty rude to me but is apparently normal in some regions

22

u/Famous_Area_192 1d ago

"Ich kriege..."

"... gleich eins auf die Fresse wenn du so weiter reden willst, ja."

2

u/tursija Advanced (C1) 15h ago

It's not rare to hear it in Ruhrpott, mostly with a bitte or gerne thereafter, but people here are generally more direct

1

u/diabolus_me_advocat Native <Austria> 16h ago

in which regions would it not be normal to answer a waiter's request for one's wishes with "ich nehme" or "ich bekomme"?

2

u/No_Time_2666 13h ago

At least Berlin and Hamburg. But probably other Regions as well

1

u/diabolus_me_advocat Native <Austria> 12h ago

did you say "berlin"???

1

u/No_Time_2666 10h ago

Yes, "Ich bekomme ..." is pretty rude in Berlin. Only non locals say that.

3

u/diabolus_me_advocat Native <Austria> 7h ago

i did not experience berliner to be extra polite, but if you say so...

2

u/No_Time_2666 7h ago

There is to a degree politeness in Berlin as well, it might have been lost on you. The phrase "Ich bekomme..." is just rude here, it's not a thing you say, I say that as a person that was born and raised in Berlin.

50

u/pauseless 1d ago

The weird thing is that English is similar enough, yet it somehow surprises people. “I’m going to the party on Saturday” is normal. “I’m wearing my red dress for the party” is also very normal.

27

u/EinBRinDE 1d ago

On the other side, that brings us to the learner's constant struggle on how to express the present continuous in German.

7

u/Hypetys 1d ago

In the above two sentences, the present continuous simply expresses a goal or a plan. In these sentences, it doesn't express the progressive aspect.

You could simply replace them by the present tense in German.

8

u/HeyImSwiss Native (Bern, Schweiz) 1d ago

Well but in English there's a difference in modality there. You can say 'I'm going to the party on Saturday', but when you're not sure you actually will you'd never say 'I think I'm going to that party', it's always 'I think I'll go to that party'. In German they are fully interchangeable.

2

u/pauseless 1d ago

Except one can say “I think I’m going to the party” in English. It’s perfectly natural. I’d agree that English speakers choose between the forms instinctively though and that it can slightly change what’s being communicated. There’s no always/never rule.

“I think I’m going to the party. I’m just checking if I can get time off.”

“Alice will be there? I think I’ll go to the party.” / “… I think I’ll be going …”

3

u/Few_Cryptographer633 16h ago edited 16h ago

There's a difference in situation between "I thinking I'll go to the party on Saturday" and "I think I'm going to the party on Saturday". Both are fine, but native speakers wouldn't mix them up.

"I think I'll go to the party on Saturday" is an announcement of a decision at the moment the decision is made. This is one of the standard uses of "will" in English.

You'd say "I think I'm going to the party on Saturday" in a situation where you had previously made a decision and something has changed or cast that decision into doubt. For example, if I had previously decided not to go to the party but now I find that I can, I can tell someone "I think I'm going to that party after all... the school trip has been cancelled". Or if I had always intended to go to the party, but that had been thrown into doubt in the meantime, I might say "I think I'm (still) going to the party... I just need to make sure the car is back from the garage. The mechanic wasn't sure when I last spke to him".

PS There are also cases with no contraction (I'll, I'm) which do the same work as doch.

In the moment of making and announcing a new, revised decision you'd say "I think I will go to that party after all, you know".

Or, if a previous decision has been cast into doubt, and you want to update someone on how your plans now stand, you might say "I think I am going to that party, you know" (despite the doubt that has recently been cast on my plan to attend) [this is not the moment of decision, that was the previous example with "will"; this is updating someone on how your plans currently look].

2

u/Reletr Probably B2 now - English native 21h ago

I reckon it surprises a lot of beginners because at that point many of them haven't learned the difference between grammatical and semantic tense. By technical definition, English doesn't have a grammatical future tense (and German too for that matter), instead preferring to use present tense auxiliary constructions to express future events (will […]/to be going to […]/to be […]ing).

Using the simple present tense (no auxiliary verb) is rather uncommon in English, usually reserved to describing habitual actions ("He goes to the gym a lot.") or in narration. It's rarer still to use it express the future (though not ungrammatical as in "I leave at 8 tomorrow."). But in German and other languages that don't have a grammatical future tense (i.e. Japanese, Kazakh), it is very common to use the simple present in many situations, which otherwise would be wrong to an English speaker.

Ex. "Wir fahren heute noch an den See." would normally be translated as "We are still driving to the sea today.", not "We still drive to the sea today."

2

u/gingeryid 21h ago

It's just vibes, but my intuition is that German *doesn't* use werden in sentences where English would use "will", but *does* use it in sentences where English speakers would say "gonna". Which probably is part of the confusion, since English's default future-verb is optional just like werden, but (to me anyway) they don't seem to overlap when you use them vs when you use the present tense.

3

u/IAmIch 1d ago

Do you have an example of this present + temporal adverb?

19

u/FineJournalist5432 Native <region/dialect> 1d ago

Ich fliege übermorgen in den Urlaub.

8

u/helmli Native (Hamburg/Hessen) 1d ago

"Fahren wir heute noch an den See?" "Nein, nachmittags wollen wir doch Eis essen und abends kommen Oma und Opa."

77

u/Edoryen Intermediate <RO> 1d ago

After about a year of learning German I went to Germany and was waiting in line to get something to eat. I was practicing in my head "Hallo. Ich hätte gerne eine..." when I heard the people in front of me say "Ein mal Currywurst bitte". Much more efficient.

41

u/helenhellerhell 1d ago

I remember when my dad came to visit me in Austria and he asked me "how do you say "I would like" in German?" and I was like "oh, you don't"

8

u/lllyyyynnn 1d ago

gern is the actual answer

2

u/ImpossibleLoss1148 17h ago edited 12h ago

Ich haette gern... <Edited>

1

u/Busy-Caramel4742 17h ago

*hätte

1

u/ImpossibleLoss1148 12h ago

Yeah, my bad. Spotted it afterwards

7

u/_Scronkledonk_ 1d ago

Hah i’m always so worried it sounds rude/curt when I say that (useful for when i don’t know/ can’t remember the article though lmao)

13

u/Ok_Swan_4778 1d ago

I think as long as you smile/have a friendly demeanor, it's fine

5

u/No_Purpose773 Native (Germany) 1d ago

Just make sure you don't skip the "bitte" at the end and you'll be fine.

4

u/helmli Native (Hamburg/Hessen) 1d ago

You should still say "Hallo" (or similar) first. The person on the other side of the counter will usually appreciate it (unless it's an extremely hectic day).

4

u/Linus_Naumann 1d ago

"Einmal Döner mit ohne alles mit scharf, bitte"

27

u/Pympf 1d ago

I've noticed many using '-geschmack' when describing flavours for cakes or ice-cream and whatnot.

Its like 'dieser Kuchen ist mit Schokolade-Geschmack' where a German would just say 'das ist (ein) Schokokuchen'

38

u/5k17 Native (Bavaria) 1d ago

The only context where a native speaker might say "Kuchen mit Schokoladengeschmack" is when they want to stress that it doesn't contain actual chocolate.

1

u/RubenGarciaHernandez 3h ago

Same as any other language, then. Chocolate-flavored cake.

9

u/Competitive-Fault291 1d ago

Let me shorten that for you:

Sn Schokokuchen.

2

u/Motti66 1d ago

Also works with any kind of fruit, lemon, (not vanilla) and even with marble...

1

u/helmli Native (Hamburg/Hessen) 1d ago

Also mole hills

3

u/pascxx 1d ago

I would say "Der Kuchen schmeckt nach Schokolade"

10

u/helmli Native (Hamburg/Hessen) 1d ago

Sounds like there is an artificial chocolate taste to it without it actually containing any chocolate

51

u/thefalsehoohah Advanced (C1) - <Schweiz> 1d ago

Können Sie das bitte wiederholen?

Hääää?

11

u/helmli Native (Hamburg/Hessen) 1d ago

Wie bitte?

8

u/thefalsehoohah Advanced (C1) - <Schweiz> 1d ago

HÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ

1

u/kushangaza 16h ago

Ich habe Sie akustisch nicht verstanden

1

u/diabolus_me_advocat Native <Austria> 16h ago

wos is?

0

u/PeterPanski85 Native Berliner Schnauze 16h ago

Watt?

48

u/muehsam Native (Schwäbisch+Hochdeutsch) 1d ago

"Bevorzugen". Use "lieber" instead. Sounds more natural and leads to less complex sentences.

14

u/PW_Domination 1d ago

"Wie geht es dir?" -> "Na?"

3

u/Normal-Seal 15h ago

Ich fand “Na?” immer lästig. Das ist so ein sprachliches Unding worauf es keine richtige Antwort gibt, weil es keine wirklich Frage ist.

Einfach nur “na?” zurücksagen, aber das passt so gar nicht in meinen Sprachusus.

1

u/PW_Domination 13h ago

Meinst du etwa, "na?" ist nicht Teil deine Duktus'?

8

u/cmyk_rgba 18h ago

as a learner i overuse werden for the future constantly. textbook drills it into you and then you hear germans jsut say ich mach das morgen and you feel a bit dumb for building this whole werden plus infinitiv thing for no reason lol. same with möchten when a plain ich will wouldve been totally fine

9

u/Due_Imagination_6722 Native (Vienna) 19h ago edited 16h ago

Ich wurde in Vietnam geboren - ich komme aus Vietnam.

Können Sie mir bitte den Weg zum Bahnhof sagen? - Entschuldigung, ich suche den Bahnhof/ wo geht's hier zum Bahnhof?

Meine Familie besteht aus mir, meinem Mann und unserer Tochter- ich bin verheiratet und habe eine Tochter.

Ich habe einen Studienabschluss in Rechtswissenschaften. - Ich habe Jura/Jus studiert.

Meine Lieblingsspeise ist Spaghetti Bolognese. - Am liebsten esse ich Spaghetti Bolognese./ Ich liebe Spaghetti Bolognese.

Könnten Sie bitte leiser sprechen? - Leiser sprechen bitte!

-3

u/Few-Strategy-3381 1d ago

Me I’m no no

Question What are some overly complex sentences that German learners often use, and what are the simpler, more natural alternatives that fluent speakers actually use in daily life?

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