The 20 LONGEST GERMAN WORDS and What They Mean

Hey rabbits!
Which is the LONGEST German word? How many letters do the longest German words have? And most importantly: What do they mean in English?
In today's video I want to present the 20 longest German words to you and tell you what they mean in English. It's truly impressive how long certain words can be and what they are used for.
Have fun with the video and let me know what you think! :)
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INTRO
"Monkey Spinning Monkeys" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
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MUSIC & SOUNDS
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[@vinnimann8101]

whaaat you just destroyed my whole life because I though Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz would be the longest German word 😱😱

[@DontTrustTheRabbit]

Sorry, haha! :D Well, I was surprised myself.

[@gizmogoose.2486]

Well...beef labeling or not, there is nothing here that is as ponderous as Welsh !!! If it's *unpronounceable* . . . it's _WELSH._ To wit: *_"Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch"_*_._ Not even Welshmen can pronounce it, so it's currently shortened to the "gyll" part. When I was a kid I was told that Welsh was *the* *proof* that there are off world Aliens among us. I believed it . . . . . _I still do!_ :o)P I'm part German and part Welsh. Maybe I should be happy I only have to speak English!

[@vinnimann8101]

Gizmo Goose. OMG that is awesome!! I really need to try pronounce that word on camera 😂😂👐

[@patrickseidel218]

Gizmo Goose. The sign at the rail station contains the whole name.:D

[@arkanmur89345]

vinnimann I can say that #lol

[@IsDeathDead]

My absolute favourite German literal translation is 'Unsterblichkeit'. It literally means 'un-die-li-ness' and the regular English word is immortality.

[@DV-zv4ox]

I always liked rainshield (umbrella) myself

[@space_ist8588]

@@DV-zv4ox I'm sorry to tell you, but that word doesn't exist. It's called "Regenschirm"

[@German-Wolf]

That's why germans don't play scrabble ^^

[@TheRealChiara_Marie]

I would. Scrabble is/ist nice :D

[@christhompson5012]

I learnt that Scrabble in German is "Wortsalat" or "Word Salad"

[@pokemongifs937]

What a joke wow

[@dalemcdaniel4703]

Fussbodenmachineverlieh...

[@ilknurtoksoz584]

In Turkish the most long word is "muaffakiyetsizleştiremiyebileceklerimizdenmişsiniz" 🤣🤣

[@kevinrodriguez4159]

Discovered your channel recently. Love your personality and fondness for linguistics

[@DontTrustTheRabbit]

Thank you, it makes me happy to hear that. :)

[@akoska]

DontTrustTheRabbit Weila Trixi! Diese Wörter sind nicht wircklich länge. Du hattest einVideo mit dort sehr lages Wort. Lezt: Der Titel sagte daß dieses Video hat zwanzig Wörter, aber du sagst nur zehn Wörter!

[@ChiLou1]

Du bist unglaublich. Du sprichst diese Worte aus, als würdest du den ganzen Tag nichts anderes sagen und ich war nicht mal fähig zu kapieren was du eine Sekunde vorher gesagt hast. Ich hab die meisten dieser Wörter noch nie zuvor gehört.

[@dunkeln18]

Love your content Trixi, thank you so much for your commitment to your community.

[@mysterious-benefactor]

My 5 year old son and I were sounding out doctor Seuss books and we got to some longer words and he started to get frustrated. We took a brake to talk about really long words and how to sound them out. I, being the tangent master I am, started talking about how long some words are in the German language. And we found your video! After some good laughs on the food intolerance word,we got back to Doctor Suess. Thank you so much for our moment and a new appreciation of compound words.

[@Seegalgalguntijak]

TKÜV, Telekommunikationsüberwachungsverordnung isn't the law for supervision of telecommunications, but the law for surveillance of telecommunications.

[@rr7firefly]

This is one of my favorite topics. Endlessly fascinating how compounded words become tongue twisters.

[@negakirine]

What I love most about the German language is that not even Germans can get the pronunciation and syntax correctly all the time :) The bloopers were the best part of this! I really like you and your videos.

[@JohnDoe-qx3zs]

And eine Verordnung is a regulation, not a law. That's more letters.

[@fremejoker]

In German Verordnung is also a law. We differentiate between material law and formal law. Laws from the Bundestag are formal laws and Verordnungen are material law. Not sure if the translation matches the actual meaning.

[@GRV1974]

I almost fell outta my chair laughing @ 3:22 when you said, "Why am I saying this in this flirty way? That's like the most unromantic thing to say." (the federal training assistance law)

[@stevehedges6749]

4:46 wenn ich mein Zeugnis seh :D

[@weltschmerz523]

Steve hedges 7:27 wenn ich mein Zeugnis sehe :D

[@stevehedges6749]

Weltschmerz besser als gedacht oder wa :D

[@weltschmerz523]

Steve hedges Naja, wie man es nimmt ... :D

[@leDespicable]

Ich krieg mich grad nicht mehr xD

[@SwordMuncher]

I absolutely love your videos Trixie - do happen to have a video about the German grammar mainly the sentence structure - when the verb goes at the end and which verb is at the end after certain words if that makes senss

[@opasworkshop8373]

great show Trixie thanks for sharing.

[@yassine234]

Life is too short to learn german

[@TheRealChiara_Marie]

Ehm, no.

[@jasming.739]

I think that's a good decision, I'm austrian and it's too complicated. If I were not speaking German, I wouldn't learn it 😂

[@TheRealChiara_Marie]

Austrian speak German?

[@jasming.739]

Chiara Marie Austrian people can speak German, but the most time we speak Austrian dialect ^^ Where are you from?

[@TheRealChiara_Marie]

Oh.. that´s interesting :D

[@Mellyy7]

The Restriktionsfragmentlängenpolymorphismus is a word (and of course a process) we had to learn in biology class. So this is really in use :D Since that it's my favorite word for the hangman game 😁

[@albertopajuelomontes2066]

Hello! I'm from Spain, and I actually speak 3 languages fluently, Spanish, English and Portuguese, and i'm looking into learning a 4º language, just for fun you know... do you recomend learning german?

[@vbvideo1669]

Sehr lustiges Video, Trixi! :)

[@ukaszdorozynski1646]

It's mainly an orthographic convention whether to separate the word parts, hyphenate them, or write them jointly. For example, the English phrase «life insurance company», although having its parts written separately, is actually pronounced as one word, with one main stress (on the syllable “life”) and can be considered a single concept word or a single compound word, like its German counterpart, except for the spaces in writing. Long German words are basically strings of many word parts.

[@anjuschka765]

Dieses "Ach du Kacke!" bei 4:47 made my day😂 ich hätte wahrscheinlich selber riesige Schwierigkeiten, diese Monsterwörter auszusprechen, i have to say you did a good job Trixi 💜

[@mircobartolotta5093]

Würde gerne ein Outtakevideo davon sehen 😋 Bin gespannt, wie oft du dich da versprochen hast!😂😎

[@johnwidmann1674]

My personal favorite didn't make it, but it is fun, nonetheless. This word has to do with the mechanical readability and difficulty to alter features of the German license plates. The script is arranged so you can't paint a line on a letter and say, change a "C" to a "G", and so forth. Here you go: "fälschungserschwerendeschrift". Love it! Love you too, Trixi, and your baby's comments at the end were great!

[@sylverscale]

John Widmann I think these are actually two words: fälschungserschwerende Schrift. Otherwise it would have to be Fälschungserschwerungsschrift (since you would have to combine to nouns as far as I know).

[@fitzopplung1409]

Ich erinnere mich noch an den "Generalsekretär des Zentralkomitees der Sozialistischen Einheitspartei Deutschlands und Vorsitzender des Staatsrates, Genosse Erich Honecker"...ist zwar nicht zusammen geschrieben aber immerhin ne ganz schön lange Anrede

[@BassaSelim]

The bloopers somehow reminded me of a Loriot sketch where Evelyn Hamann has to do the synopsis of the first eight parts of the sixteen part TV crime thriller "The Two Cousins". I wonder what you would make out of that :)

[@sissidieauswanderin]

BassaSelim Oh I miss Loriot! Evelyn is my hero!!!

[@seesixCM6]

Wonderful video. I was impressed with your pronunciation on all of them, but became disillusioned when you showed bloopers. German is a fascinating language that I'll never fully understand.

[@thewordsthewoods]

The weird thing is, most of the time when I encounter long words in German, they don't have hyphens, so it's super difficult to distinguish the different parts at first.

[@alphaandliarize]

it's 3am and I'm laughing out loud. I really like this person. It's so entertaining and educational. I'm still laughing as I type this and i'm losing compusure. Good night

[@adrian-4767]

You speaking at the end of the bloopers sounded like a talking-to (well, actually the soudn of the German language itself sounds like a talking-to lol). I don't have any idea of what you said but it sounded funny hahah

[@muskyrat2106]

I love the bloopers with baby talk lol. Do you alway talk to her in German or Spanish and English as well? Do you think it would be easier of harder for her to be multilingual as she learns from a young age?

[@Krackerlack]

in my language (Czech) the longest is a puny 30 characters: Nejneobhospodařovavatelnějších

[@tasyaspineapple7803]

hiii i come from germany and i am very (i forget the word hehehe ..) proud of you that you can veerryy good speak german, this is awsome!!:D

[@davidramos5559]

Could you do a video sharing your experiences in Germany and the differences between different states, cities and all that??? :) tat would be awesome!

[@STEFAN9484]

she has a video where she talks about pronouncing groups of letters , and letter R , but i cannot find it , can someone give me the link ?

[@DerKuhtoaster]

I work with a "Graphitrohrofenatomabsorpsionsspektoskop" directly translated it means: "graphite tube oven atom absorption spectroscopic analysis"

[@tubekulose]

Auf englisch heißt die die Donau aber "Danube", liebe Trixi.

[@jenniferrozsas7160]

I live in The Netherlands making me a foreigner. But, I was raised part Dutch, part German so I am able to pronounce these words. I found a loopole!

[@ProductofWit]

Hochleistungsflüssigkeitschromatographie, amazing when your language compounds words everywhere unlike English (more of an orthography thing right?). In practice everyone uses the English abbreviation HPLC, though, and calls it by the abbreviation.

[@tranphuong7309]

can i substitute these words by using a sentence with different components rather than nouns onlyy ?????

[@dutchik5107]

yeah I can pronounce them. but I'm Dutch and I need to study for my speaking exam now.

[@webtelecity]

the examples of the words you cited are combined words and even phrases , what's about words that do mean one single thing , just like : Kraftfahrzeugwerkstaat !

[@carmenschmidt3479]

Nice Video ;D

[@klopferator]

Ich hab spontan gelacht, als du auf einmal in diese Schlafzimmerstimme gewechselt hast. Und dann gleich noch mal, als du das selbst gemerkt hast. :D Kleiner Tippfehler übrigens bei 2:40 ^^

[@IceFerret2]

The German word you created, could be used as a English word search puzzle. NICE

[@lunaschrtr1480]

Kreuzschlitzschraubenzieher my favorite word😂

[@pauls0416]

That baby is going to learn a lot more than German. He/she will also learn English, slang, cursing and being flirty.

[@miketuppen6438]

I once had to type out "Betriebsvertetungsverhaeltnisses" - no idea what it means! Also, I thought occupations which are several words in English are said as one word in German - zum Beispiel - Donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftskapitaen. If you are a sales lady for a GmbH that makes track ballast cleaning machines, are you a Gleischotterreinigungsmaschinengesellschaftsverkauferin?

[@pachuses4963]

Was ist mit eierschalenzollbruchstellenverursacher?

[@rrricebun]

I broke my tongue while trying to pronounce these words :D

[@iwearleatherjackets1]

And here I thought “antidisestablishmentarianism” was long.

[@levicusx]

David What about hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliaphobia?

[@levicusx]

Or... pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis?

[@alphaandliarize]

no. stop

[@TheHorrorDevotee]

Hehe, My native language (Welsh) technically has a pretty long word - Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch

[@charlotteice5704]

Braulio R. It is obvious that you aren't German.

[@adimikimkoydu]

Oh my goodness :D

[@adamfalke]

Hey, what about the Ententeichmittelpunktbestimmungsgerätehaltevorrichtung? Not to forget the Wechselspannugsüberbrückungskondensatorgehäuseverschluß

[@patrickseidel218]

Number four of the second list was part of an exam in the "Abitur". I like long words and prefer it to keep the sense in one word, but that was at a certain point really annoying.:D

[@TheEulerID]

The longest word in (most) serious English dictionaries is pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis a word that refers to a lung disease contracted from the inhalation of very fine silica particles, specifically from a volcano; medically, it is the same as silicosis.

[@roberts1677]

Here I thought Bundesnachrichtendienst was a mouthfull.

[@CorvanEssen]

I remember me trying to read a word during a safety meeting a.k.a. knowing where not to go because radiation in physics experiment. One powerpoint said something like Arbeitzplatzsicherheitvorschriftenhandleitung... something something. I think I didn't quite get everything from the meeting.

[@youwantmyname9208]

Nobody Germany: *NO SPACE, TIGHT THE LETTERS TOGETHER*

[@MrVitorao]

from portuguese to german, there is a big path to go through. Hope i learn this Language soon

[@theinsfrijonds]

German has some Latin/Romance words but no more than ~15% of the language. That would be challenging. Also, it has significantly more complex combinations of sounds. The Romance languages don't have as many allowed consonant clusters but are know for following the Sonority Hierarchy to a tee, like in Spanish psicologi'a with ps. Also, the words don't work the same way in terms of order patterns. In Romance, prepositions after verbs really only serve to combine the verb with the rest of the sentence. German and English use of phrasal verbs, nuance of preposition meaning, and compounding far surpass Romance languages. German even maintains old left-branching head directionality for prefixed verbs, which facilitates clear morphological derivations. Sadly, the sound changes in Romance from Latin destroyed the transparency of many prefixes and dulled the creative power of the languages quite a bit. Instead, they cobble together phrases, 'de' 'de' 'de'. Long sentences are shortened by the phrase being pronounced as consistent, short syllables though. German and English have two and three lengths of syllables, so we reduce length of unstressed syllables and function words. They're very different languages

[@MrVitorao]

theinsfrijonds shure, German and latin evolve very far away from each other and because of that, they have little connections. But German sound beautiful and unique. that's why i want to learn this language. Is that true that all substantives in german must start with a upper case letter?

[@PeakApex]

@@MrVitorao did you do it?

[@MrVitorao]

@@PeakApex no lol but i improved my english at least :(

[@PeakApex]

@@MrVitorao sad

[@ko-lq7vu]

Aw :) she was speaking to her baby In german. That was so cute. Was she talking about a ball?

[@Sacuto34]

I'll still stay with "Multifunktionssandwichtoasterwaffeldounutmakergrill" (mit USB-Anschluss) as my favourite long german word xD

[@pierreabbat6157]

Restrikzionfragmentlängepolymorphismus. The abbreviation is pronounced "riflip" in English. What's the German for SNP?

[@lenastorm6280]

How about Frühsommermeningoenzephalitis (FSME)? Or Donnaudammschiffskapitänskajütentürschlüsselanhänger?

[@pidi_patrick]

OMG, im Normalfall muss ich nur ein paar englische Wörter von Trixi nachschauen, was sie bedeuten. Dieses mal sind sogar einige deutsche dabei, die mir erst mal nix sagen xD

[@EZ3James]

lol at "Am I able to pronounce these words?" That would be a hard no

[@michaelm9688]

Is your baby going to be trilingual? It must be awesome to have two bilingual parents.

[@zappel64]

don't know if this word is in the Duden, but it is definitely the coolest: Bundespräsidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebung, postponement of the repeat of the run-off election for federal president Austrian Word of the year 2016 :D

[@moritzb.801]

wo ist der eierschalensollbruchstellenverursacher?

[@PileOfLeafes]

Dampfschiffahrtsgesellschaftsgebäudeversicherungsgesellschaftsmanager...not really a used word but what I love about my language is that you can make these words up...it doesn't really make any sense...steam shipping company building insurance company manager...I don't think something like this exists but examples like this are very common

[@maximilienrobespierre7927]

My friend once trolled his high school German teacher by submitting a 4-page long essay written with just one super long word.

[@shawnlow573]

Hello Trixie!

[@DontTrustTheRabbit]

Hello! :)

[@michaelterry1000]

At the Munich Train Station they have a Hauptbahnhofuntergrundbahnhaltestelle. Now, did I just make up that word or is it legitimate?

[@crhistiandemarco4308]

What about Donaudampfschifffarthsgeselldchsftskapitänsmütze? I came here for that one 😂

[@HolyDiver691]

“Donaudampfschifffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft," meaning, the "Association for Subordinate Officials of the Head Office Management of the Danube Steamboat Electrical Services."

[@hd.horsediary1943]

in german you can do words as long as you want, because you may add words for an new one , so that they make sence ;)

[@Big_Pete95]

Trixi, die Donau nennt "the Danube" auf Englisch.

[@tomlehmann5060]

Big Pete Wieso sollte man Eigennamen übersetzen? Es ist doch so, dass der Name einer Sehenswürdigkeit (oder jetzt die Donau) in jeder Sprache so bleibt.. halt nur mit einem anderen Akzent ausgesprochen

[@noybh]

Beef Labeling Supervisory Task Distribution? I love it...I mean, I don't love it, but I love it.

[@gaiaorigin9569]

There is a reason we simply call things like "Hochleistungsflüssigkeitschromatpgraphie" just HPLC in the lab :D

[@acc45460]

Achja, die Bloopers xD Ich kann solche langen Wörter in die Richtung „Elektrizität“ oder „Identität“ auch nicht beim ersten Versuch aussprechen.. Das wird dann meistens „Identitität“ :D

[@Cherrysaudi]

I like saying Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzung randomly to anyone and in any situation.

[@crazyowlgirlxox3943]

Once my teacher told me that the longest word she knew was German and was geschwindigskeitbeschrenkung (speed limit). I tried to make the longest word I could but the longest I could get was weinachtsbaumdecorationsaufhengergereht (Christmas tree decoration hanger uperer device 😂😂)

[@YTDeepshock]

Bureaucracy and science. Sounds about right.

[@rollandc.6118]

That's some sick green screen bro.

[@justacat909]

German:long word. Chinese:imagine having long word, the longest word I have is 4 character

[@pieter1102]

When I was young there was a running joke that the longest German word was Eisenbahnknotenpunkthinundherschieber = rail road switch operator. It was used to show us that German loves compound words where English keeps the words separate so that sometimes you are not sure whether a word is part of what you try to describe or some other part of the sentence. But I now learn that there are much longer real words than the one we made up. Another childhood myth destroyed!

[@Daweisstebescheid]

Hey Trixi, you are heavy on wire

[@Terminator775]

And then there's me who thought that doppelkupplungsgetriebe is one of the longest words in German language. Puny isnt it?

[@kevintennert5290]

Der Berufstitel: "Donaudampfschifffahrtskapitän" hätte genauso Deiner Übersetzungsliste gepasst aber ich hab sicherlich nicht erwartet, dass Du von allen langen Worten in dieser Katogorie wusstest.

[@arehly6702]

How did you say all these with in 8 minutes? (._.)

[@jejwood]

The last two minutes are bloopers, so 6.

[@ruggerividotto1]

So, I was sick last week and I wanted to tell my friends from Germany that I had sinusitis. Well... I had "die Nasennebenhöhlenentzündung" Why, German? Why?

[@fremejoker]

Because we can and it decribes it to a deeper level than English is able to.

[@hasch5756]

It is an "Entzündung" (infection) of a "Höhle" (cavity) which is situated "neben" (on the side) of the "Nase" (nose). Now there's so much more information squeezed inside the German word, all the while a "sinusitis" could be misinterpreted as something pertaining to trigonometry

[@ruggerividotto1]

H. Sch. You guys don't really have sense of humor, do you?

[@hasch5756]

Rudi Vidotto Not really. Got a problem with that?

[@ruggerividotto1]

H. Sch. Not at all, my friend. Ich wünsche dir nen schönen Tag :)

[@walt2840]

I was going to Germany to be stationed there with the Air Force. My wife was bragging about how her husband spoke German. A Veteran Army Spouse going back to Germany said, "Oh really? What do you call the thing that shoots water on your windshield?". Windschutzscheibewicherspritzer

[@Ozzy_2014]

very excellent composer forgotten by history and German. but you'll have to hear about it from the boys at Monty Python!

[@AmorionPax]

Christoph Waltz brough me here

[@24jh42]

As a Dane I can relate. A word like "speciallægepraksisplanlægningsstabiliseringsperiode " has no problem being used by the authorities. We simply add on words like the Germans Menneskerettighedskrænkelserne means The human rights violations Menneskerettighedskrænkelsesdomme means The human rights violations convictions Menneskerettighedskrænkelsesdommerstanden The judges that convicts in the human rights violation Frederikssundsvejtunnelen means the tunnel under the road Frederikssundsvej Atombombeprøvesprængninger means nuclear bomb explosions Undervisningsdifferentiering is in the dictionary meaning education differentiation. It relates to the education principle of adapting different education techniques that suits the individual students instead of the practice of teacher saying stuff and the pupils just repeating. It stopped the old education principle of students not learning by repetition are stupid and destined for manual labor.

[@OmarDelawar]

Gewschindichkeitsbegrentzungsgesetz = speed limit

[@l.e.f.4016]

Geschwindigkeit not Geschwindichkeit Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzung = Speed limit (Geschindigkeit = Speed, Begrenzung = Limit) Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzungsgesetz - Speed limit law (This law does not exist) Sorry, when I'm a little nit-picking

[@boffo25]

I like the fact that German laws are made of just one word

[@LuisRojas-qc7rv]

trixie is stacked my lord

[@dominicschmidt8275]

What about Rinderettiketierungs...

[@Cae_the_Kitsune]

I'm not sure "road traffic approval regulation" is randomly combined. The order of the words is important to the meaning of the whole English phrase.

[@TheMusiclover500]

idk why but you sounded very Irish when you said the Duden Corpus lol

[@brianlastname3808]

I love your voice.

[@randomperson-ic9pe]

What about Donaudampfachifffahrts...