5 Reasons Why Dutch is a Difficult Language to Learn

Let's face it, learning Dutch is not so easy. So what are some elements that make this language of the Netherlands a difficult one to learn? In this video, I'm talking about 5 of these reasons. At the end, you get to decide whether you're up for the challenge of mastering this language or not.
Are you learning Dutch? If so, what do you find the most difficult? Let me know down in the comments.
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[@murateren5712]

I personally don't find Dutch necessarily difficult because most languages have these difficulties. Actually for an English speaker it ranks amongst the easiest languages to learn. But finding the urge and motivation to learn is hard. 😅

[@MakingitinHolland]

Haha! Yep, motivation is definitely THE most important component to say the least. What holds you back from motivating yourself?

[@evangeliamintzai6302]

Dutch is the easiest language for native English speakers.

[@HansS11160]

@@MakingitinHolland I'm Dutch and I'm still learning to speak and write good English. Translation: Ik ben Nederlands en ik leer nog steeds goed Engels te spreken en te schrijven. Dutch would also use the word 'om' a lot: Ik ben Nederlands en ik leer nog steeds om goed Engels te spreken en te schrijven. Yes, English is often shorter. Google translate had another version: I am Dutch and I am still learning to speak and write English well Translated into Dutch this would be bad Dutch: Ik ben Nederlands en ik ben nog steeds lerende te spreken en schrijven Engels goed Love is a big motivation: if one loves a person who speaks another language, one is motivated to learn his or her language.

[@pwkh763]

Hard part is pronunciation

[@TaMasterx]

@@evangeliamintzai6302;-;

[@snuff2482]

The fact is Dutch is easier than we imagine And it's harder than our imagination Don't be much scared you need to start and be patient in learning process

[@MakingitinHolland]

Thanks for sharing!

[@brsglobalvize]

entertaining, humorous and informative video !!! I'm glad to see you backk !

[@MakingitinHolland]

Thank you :) I'm glad you liked it and it's nice to be back!

[@SwittyKiwi]

Never learned Dutch before, but it's good to know the tips you're giving here. Have been to NL before, but fortunately everybody spoke English, so we were lucky. Thanks, Gulce! - ✨ *Your Awesome Friends at The S'witty Kiwi Show* 💗

[@MakingitinHolland]

Yes, learning Dutch becomes tough sometimes because indeed everyone speaks English (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing of course). Thank you so much for your support!

[@weiareinboud6990]

About the g: it is not pronounced in the throat, but at the end of the palatum, just before the uvula. So it has nothing to do with spitting. Furthermore: there is much variation in how Dutch and Belgian people produce the g. The soft one in the southern half of the Dutch speaking area is perfect. But in the northern half there is much variation too, the hardest sounding one is only the end of a continuum. So listen carefully and pick out a relative easy one and practice that one.

[@fvry402]

Dear....(?), thanks for posting this video, you did such a nice job. Perhaps the following is of interest to you regarding dutch and english: Alquin of York lived in the 8th century, he lived, ofcourse, in York/England and was a wellknown scholar. Alquin went to visit Charlemagne in Aachen and on his route he visited the LowCountries (the names, Holland of Netherlands didnot yet exist in those days). He wrote a poem about this voyage and tells us, that he visited Utrecht. According to the poem he spoke his mothertongue (AngloSaxon) with the inhabitants of Utrecht and they had no problem understanding him. How can that be? I reckon, because in those days there was no rift between English and Dutch, the languages were still the same. (greetings, frits)

[@raven_bard]

I've just started learning Dutch and the thing I'm struggling with most so far is definitely the pronunciation. I'll keep the "I'm about to hock a loogie" tip in mind for those guttural sounds 😅 but so far, it hasn't been too tedious to learn. I'm enjoying it.

[@marias.3604]

Nice video and channel 😊 Dutch isn't very difficult, to my mind. Of course it depends on what languages you speak before you start with Dutch. For instance, I speak German, so the word order is the same for both languages.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Thank you! ☺️ yeah I think it really depends on the perception and what languages you already know. I think knowing German is definitely an advantage! ☺️

[@fvry402]

excellently done, i reckon, you are yourself a teacher in dutch...

[@evangeliamintzai6302]

There are many rules that you can remember about het and de. All the words that end in -ing, - heid, - atie take de. Words that end in -um take het.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Nice! Thanks for sharing this! ☺️

[@DoruStoica]

Thanks for the tips. I give up anyway after my first year of living in the Netherlands. :(

[@UXER260]

4:18 “Ik moet jullie laten boodschappen doen” is actually incorrect. It can be interpreted as: “I have to let you do the grocery shopping”. As if it is meant that you actually wanted to do it but had to let them do it. The correct way of saying it is: “Ik moet jullie de boodschappen laten doen” Which translates to: “I have to make you do the grocery shopping”

[@dutchyjhome]

Fact is that Dutch and English are most related to each other as they come both from the same Germanic origin. Yes English is just another Germanic language, just as Dutch and German are. They how ever are not the same and will take some effort to master. How ever, if there is one foreign language for native English speakers which is the easiest to learn it actually is Dutch. These are the facts. The rest you may hear about the Dutch language (is difficult, hard to pronounce) is not based on facts but are personal opinions. So no more excuses...Dutch is the easiest lango for you guys to learn !

[@kuda9828]

Even easier when you both English and German lmao learning it now out of curiosity but it has pretty easy so far thx to German

[@mep6302]

In fact, if you know Dutch, German becomes easier because their grammar and vocabulary are a little more similar. But German grammar is way harder

[@SelfImprovement1111]

Well I’m having a hard time in pronunciation. It’s grammatically easier to learn yes but I find German is easier to speak for me personally. For me Dutch is a tongue twister haha

[@user-vm6dx3te2f]

No English more like Romanian then German and Dutch. Compare for example. Apotheek and Pharmacy ,Pharmacea

[@tameroz7595]

Hi, Nice of you to make this video. It sure helps some folks. A couple points First one is that all pularel nouns would be " de " . Second one is I think when you use the verb te loop or te gaan, simple past would be, ik ben gelopen, ik ben gegaan instead of ik heb. Again cheers for the video.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Hey Tamer, yes! good to mention all plural nouns are 'de' indeed. Loop, liep, ben gelopen! Of course thanks for the correction, but hey it goes to show mistakes do happen when there's a lot to keep in mind 😀 I'm glad you enjoyed the video!

[@tameroz7595]

@@MakingitinHolland Well when you learn / speak a foreign language, you (in general) bound to make mistakes and like you've said it, practise makes it perfect. Another point what makes Dutch a difficult language to learn that the Dutch people use a lot of idioms or phrases like " Het valt mee " meaning, not that bad, it's OK.

[@mariadebake5483]

'Ik heb een uur lang rond gelopen'. HEB. Words like lopen, rijden, fietsen etc. can have either 'zijn' or 'hebben'. Depending on the use

[@thewelltravelledkitchen6714]

#5 is my biggest challenge. Even though my pronunciation is good, I still get caught out, and Dutch people end up answering back in English. Sigh.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Yeah! I really feel you, I still experience this as well. You really have to fight to speak Dutch back 😃

[@asexplore7859]

@@MakingitinHolland Ma'am I am looking for Hospital sector job in Nederlands. And I don't know dutch language. Can I get job in Nederlands without knowing dutch language? Please tell me.

[@mariadebake5483]

@@asexplore7859 In a hospital? Without knowing Dutch? No chance at all.

[@ZubeidaEssa]

I Speak Afrikaans which is the daughter language of Dutch. So I understand Dutch because it's very similar to Afrikaans language

[@Verge63]

Dutch sounds like someone is having a hacking spell.

[@MaxLearnsPersian]

"difficult" does not mean anything by itself, it depends on what languages you already know. For people who speak Afrikaans and German, Dutch is very very easy. For English speakers it is also quite easy, when compared to someone who only speaks Chinese or Arabic. I like your video. Only I would like to say to the others who read this comment: please note, 'difficult' is a relative concept. As an English speaker it will take you 600 hours of study/class/practice to get to a B2 level. If you do one hour a day, it will take you less than two years. That doesn't sound that bad? Now putting in the hours, that is the hard part :)

[@user-vm6dx3te2f]

I'm ukrainian. How you think it's easy even when I can speak English? No exactly. I think I never finish learning that hard language. My mother said it's like Hungarian but more English words🤣 she was in Hungary there is language very hard and difficult. Dutch also difficult

[@MaxLearnsPersian]

Learning a language is always very hard! I mean that Dutch takes for an English speaker about 600 hours to learn to a B2 level, but for someone who speaks Arabic it will take about 2200 hours. So Dutch is 'easy' for you, and 'difficult' for a speaker of Arabic, you see? Even though it is still a hard thing to do! It's relative. Oekranian for me is easier than CHinese, but both are very hard. @@user-vm6dx3te2f

[@user-vm6dx3te2f]

​@MaxLearnsPersian For me easy language it's Polish. Because slavic languages is similar. English also. Dutch like Hungarian,Estonian, Finnish or something that so hard .

[@waterblonk]

It’s “ik moet jullie boodschappen laten doen” which is even more backwards

[@bobbymarshall80]

Sounds like the similar issues with learning Danish!

[@TaMasterx]

Ik praat Nederlands maar Surinaams Nederlands ( I speak Dutch but Surinamese Dutch

[@MakingitinHolland]

That’s awesome!

[@andreman86]

So I don't think most of these points really matter as: 2) Word order may be weird but I mean most languages can change the word order (especially in Greek which I am native) so for me personally it's not a problem 3) The "De" and "Het" may be a pain but most languages have systems like this such as French which has you remember Un and Une and there it sometimes can be complicating 4) Irregular verbs is something every language has and there's no getting around it, although 200 irregular verbs to me don't sound like a lot as I feel there would be many more but Idk 5) I mean yeah you could just tell them to speak dutch lol For me the only hard part is really pronunciation and especially when I have to differentiate "V" from "W" and the vowels from their long counter parts as I am not used to that, although the spit sound is something I am native to so that isn't a problem for me I think language is something that is obviously hard to learn and Dutch compared to most languages is really similar to English, I think it's worth a shot

[@scottlafferty6448]

“Ik weet dat het waarschijnlijk makkelijker voor jou is om met me in Engels te praten, maar het is better voor mij om in Nederlands te praten” I say this a lot.

[@MakingitinHolland]

That’s already quite advanced Dutch!

[@piitii8348]

Impressive! Your Dutch seems very advanced, this is complicated word order. Can I maybe suggest a way of saying this that sounds more natural? Because I don't think any Dutch person would say this. It would be something like: Ik weet dat het voor jou makkelijker is om Engels met me te praten, maar het is beter voor mij om Nederlands te spreken. The most important change is leaving out "in". We say "Nederlands spreken" not "in Nederlands spreken". If we were to use "in", we would say "in het Nederlands" of "in het Engels". But in this sentence it feels more natural to just leave it out. To me, "spreken" also feels better in the second part of the sentence. I would have to do a bit of research if you'd like me to explain why. And yes, it is a useful sentence. I have only realized recently that I was hurting people by switching to English for convenience. I try to be better about it!

[@mariadebake5483]

@@piitii8348 Praten in het laatste geval zou een herhaling zijn van het eerdere woord praten, en dat klinkt niet mooi. Het is dus niet een grammaticale fout maar wèl een stijlfout (ook al is dat er misschien een groot woord voor)

[@ashish9501]

Wow nice video I will learn dutch 👍😎👍 😍😍😍

[@MakingitinHolland]

I’m glad you liked this video! I highly recommend starting especially if you plan on staying here for a while ☺️

[@steve00alt70]

Its easy because what you pronounce is actually what you read or write. Compared to the extreme end mandarin chinese where The pronunciation is not related to the writing of Chinese words (characters).

[@Mundodevideojuegos436]

Are you a spanish speaker ? I don't know but your pronunciation in english sounf like someone who speak my language , but yeah every language has its hard things

[@MakingitinHolland]

I do get this remark quite a lot, but I'm unfortunately not a Spanish speaker. I'm from Turkey. :)

[@SP-po5qg]

The Dutch seem to enjoy watching us take huge breaths to struggle mimicking, after they show us the G throat clearing sound. They don't seem to speak to one another in this animated way. I have a deep regard for the Dutch, but in this case -Do as they speak, not as they say.

[@mep6302]

4:23 As a Spanish speaker who's learned Portuguese, French and Italian, I'm already used to gendered nouns. And yes, I always recommend that you learn the word with its correct article. I think there's no other way to memorize gender. This works for me. In English you don't need to do this because the articles are always the same: the and a(n)

[@Idontthinkilive]

are genders similar in dutch compared to spanish?

[@conraddaubanton1662]

I made the mistake of learning words without their respective "hey" or "de" articles and that implied having to learn those words again with their correct articles. For example of you are learning the Dutch weird for "house“, do not learn just "huis"; learn "the house", which in Dutch is "het huis". In case of "man", do not learn *man" by itself, rather learn "the man", which is "de man". All diminutives take the "het" article, such as "the girl" which is "het meisje". Finally all plurals use the "de" article, regardless of what was their singular article. "The man" is "de man", and "the men" is "de mannen". Now for the "Het words": "the house" is "het huis", but "the houses" is "de huizen". Learning all your nouns with their proper articles, as if the article were part of the word, will make the path to mastery of the language easier. Regarding the "guttural" sounds of "ch" and "g", they are common in several other languages like in Spanish (where it is written as "j"), Germán (where it is written as "ch") and in Scots/Gaelic, (where ig is written as "ch") and where the word "loch" (as in Loch Ness) is often mispronounced by English speakers as “lock“. Learning to produce a sound which doesn't exist in your native language may be initially complicated, involving moving your mouth, tongue, lips and throat in new and previously unknown forms, but again having a Dutch listener who can tell you when you've .made the right sound is a great help. Production of new,unusual of strange sounds is a challenge for learners of English too. Spanish, for example has five vowel sounds where English has twenty, but with only the same give letters (vowels) to write them. Some languages are spoken just as they are written, such as Spanish, Turkish or Japanese. They are phonetically simple languages, where ghe relationship between the written form and the spoken form is clear and precise, and the language is w er ll adapted to the Roman alphabet. English is quite a😅nother matter, the sounds of English are not so well adapted to the Roman alphabet, resulting in strange groups of letters sounding as one sigle letter does. Take "through", whish is pronounced as "thru". That "ough" should sound like "u" or "oo" does not make life easier for those who are learning English. Again, a good system, and a good teacher, coupled with a good and motivated hard-working student will be of great help in learning a new language .

[@conraddaubanton1662]

Please excuse the typos which result from having thich fingers typing on a diminutive telephone (mobile/cellular) virtual keyboard. 😕

[@RichardJucewicz]

there ARE rules for de and het words. they don't cover all words, but quite a bit.

[@LegoCityFilms]

Its the accent and part of the pronunciation

[@stefanreints1108]

good video but you forgot te exemptions

[@MakingitinHolland]

Good one!

[@jeboivandeberg7739]

When comparing dutch to english then ofcourse dutch is hard because english is like the easiest out there. And language learning in itself is definitely hard. But I can say confidently that dutch is definitely objectively easier than french and german. So i would say that english is the easiest and following that it’s dutch.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Good points!

[@danieleyre8913]

I've been told from so many people that English is a very difficult language for most of the world to learn because it breaks its own rules and because of the vowel shifts and its idiosyncrasies. But if it's easy for Dutch people to learn; then that proves that English and Dutch are close and that Dutch is not very difficult for English speakers to learn if they try hard enough.

[@mep6302]

@@danieleyre8913 The most difficult aspect of English when I was a beginner was: pronunciation (especially vowels). Grammar was not hard, I only had to get used to the differences with my native language (Spanish). And vocabulary same thing. I had to get used to new vocabulary (especially those with Germanic roots)

[@user-vm6dx3te2f]

​@danieleyre8913 no I can't learn that language even when I know English.

[@turbominator]

4:18 You should actually say "ik moet jullie boodschappen laten doen" instead of "ik moet jullie laten boodschappen doen"

[@mai0033]

Any foreign language is challenging... not just dutch.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Good point!

[@miatx6818]

Actually most dutch ppl pronounce Verschrikkelijk more like Versrikelijk Because the rough G is not good for our throats Thats why we don’t pronounce the hard G not that much Only a more softer G, not like the Limburgers but a lesser hard G

[@MakingitinHolland]

Interesting insight! Thank you for sharing.

[@GresikBoys]

Jij hebt goed gedaan

[@MakingitinHolland]

Dank je!

[@meriamboogerd]

i am from holland

[@alizeemusson]

Always struggled with Dutch, I think it's because it's so different from my mother tongue.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Yeah the part of your throat you use to make sounds in French is a bit different than Dutch. It’s totally understandable!

[@FireGaminingYT2020]

I am failing my dutch classes lol ( WHILE I LIVE IN THE NETHERLANDS)

[@MakingitinHolland]

Oh no!

[@MakingitinHolland]

What is it about Dutch that you find the most challenging?

[@jasperdiscovers]

the KR or SCHR sound is hard! how they easily go from the scraping throat sound to a rolling R baffles me and I can't produce the sound at all :) Like in words as kracht, crème, kroeg or schram, schrappen, schreef, scheren... Hate it :D

[@MakingitinHolland]

Yes! This consonant letter combination is the hardest. It sounds silly, but the best tip I’ve received about this is to pretend like you’re about to spit on the floor and use that ‘momentum’ to create those sounds. With practice it becomes a bit easier. 😃

[@CisnerosFuente]

The sintaxis as you mentioned too. It drives me crazy. Also the numbers, because they are written/read from left to right ex. 22 tweeëntwintig it’s still confusing. Nevertheless, I been just learning for 3 months. So practice makes perfection.

[@MakingitinHolland]

Definitely agree practice makes perfect!

[@giloises]

@@CisnerosFuente In het begin is het een kwestie van de regels te leren. Daarna is het meer een kwestie van ritme. Door veel te praten en te luisteren begin je onbewust aan te voelen wanneer het goed zit. Je hersenen doen dat vanzelf. Een goede manier om snel een taal te leren, is liedjes zingen. Veel succes!

[@weiareinboud6990]

Pronunciation is difficult in any language. English is much harder to pronounce for Dutchies than the reverse. The 'g' is easy for every speaker of Spanish or Arab, for example. But yes, not for speakers of English. Spelling of Dutch is a hundred times easier than the spelling of English. You'll indeed have to learn which words are 'de' and which 'het', but that is the case with many languages. Here English is very easy!

[@ronaldderooij1774]

I am native Dutch and I think the word "er" "om" "om te" are a disaster for foreigners. As for "de" and "het" you mistook your Dutch teacher. Every Dutch person knows the difference and nobody will make a mistake. What Dutch people lost is that "de" is for male AND female words. We have no clue anymore which words are male or female. As for the pronounciation, linguïsts will tell you that Dutch only has ONE unique sound that no other language in the world has, and that is the "ui". The glutteral g is also present in arabic and hebrew for example. Another difficulty is that half of the "e" will be pronounced as a "schwa" (like uh) in Dutch. Which half, yep, that's the problem.

[@declanburns6382]

is it harder than german

[@LegoCityFilms]

Nope

[@achmadiid8644]

Where are you from actually?

[@spookie_sammie]

we dutch people cant even pronounce 'Uil" correctly since everyone does it different but try "hottentottententoonstelling Scheveningen" or "autoventieldopjesfabriekAmsterdam" or maybe try to pronouns 'Uil'

[@evildjinn9]

The only way that any language is going to be difficult is if you're lazy. You only want to discourage people from learning a new language because you're not doing so well with the Dutch language.

[@MakingitinHolland]

I actually speak really good Dutch, this video was intended as edutainment purposes. It wasn’t intended to discourage people but to raise awareness. ☺️

[@jooproos6559]

Its named the Netherlands!Not Holland!Holland are just two provinces!North Holland and South Holland..

[@evangeliamintzai6302]

Dutch is not difficult at all. If I would think of a difficult language that would be Chinese or Japanese or Arabic. And my language Greek is very difficult too. How is Turkish?

[@MakingitinHolland]

I guess it really depends on how people perceive the language. But at least it’s the Latin alphabet so that makes it a teeny bit easier than let’s say Chinese or Greek. 😃 Turkish can also be difficult. Actually, when I look at it objectively it’s probably more difficult to learn but at least the Turkish pronunciation is easier you read the way you write. 😃

[@amosamwig8394]

define difficult because arabic is not difficult at all

[@GlentusYT]

I don't think it's hard because i'm dutch XD

[@MakingitinHolland]

That explains haha!

[@DeluxeLog]

Learning from a young age is better

[@shiveerramphal1802]

Well for me I can actually pick it up well. I speak English and Afrikaans. Maybe its cause you don’t speak a native germanic language.

[@TravAlligator]

Are you an Indian? Just curious to know if Indians find it easier to pick up the Dutch language.

[@shiveerramphal1802]

@@TravAlligator I’m off indian descent but I’m South African. There’s around 1,5 million of us in South Africa that were brought by the British. My family has been here for 6 generations and I’ve actually never set foot in India 😅 I’d say I’m ethnically Indian but 100% South African.

[@TravAlligator]

@@shiveerramphal1802 That's interesting to know, thanks 😊. You must visit India one day!

[@1.minute.teacher]

Hollanda'da Yasam🔔 İyi günler, videonuzu izledim. Herkes için hukuk, ekonomi ve tarih videoalrım için yorumlarınızı bekliyorum. Beğeneceğinizi düşündüm.Örnek: Özlü Söz , AtaSözü, Güzel Sözler Gibi Nankör insan, her şeyin fiyatını bilen fakat hiçbir şeyin değerini bilmeyen kimsedir. Oscar Wilde. *💎

[@MakingitinHolland]

Tesekkurler.

[@Volt_Bolt]

I was born in Belgium and this is all the Dutch I know how to say but what does it mean Ik ga jou nooit op geven Zal je nooit teleurstellen Zal nooit rondrennen en je in de steek laten Zal je nooit laten huilen Nooit afscheid nemen Zal nooit een leugen vertellen en je pijn doen

[@PeterVandenSchoor]

Als dit liedje straks niet uit mijn hoofd is kom ik vannacht bij je spoken... 😳

[@alexnoahllourenc5062]

Dutch is the light version of German. Once one learnt German first , Dutch will be a peace of cake. Only the letter G is the trouble one Lol.. a real pain in the #%

[@UwU-yu6cg]

Wtf are u saying dutch is so easy

[@MakingitinHolland]

Happy to hear you think so!

[@Prince_Yonte]

@@MakingitinHolland 🖤

[@robertboender5816]

And still making mistakes lol

[@MakingitinHolland]

Hahaha yeah I know! I realized after filming this 😂😅 but hey, always up for learning!

[@robertboender5816]

@@MakingitinHolland I guess we Dutchies make also mistakes speaking or writing English :-)

[@MakingitinHolland]

Yep! But hey, at least now I’ll never make the the mistake ‘heb gelopen’ (buries head down in shame) 😅