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German
German

Afrikaans
Afrikaans



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German vs Afrikaans

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Countries

Countries

Austria, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Switzerland
South Africa

Total No. Of Countries

71
0 46
👆🏻

National Language

Germany
South Africa

Second Language

North Dakota, United States of America
Namibia, South Africa

Speaking Continents

Europe
Africa

Minority Language

Czech Republic, Denmark, Former Soviet Union, France, Hungary, Italy, Namibia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia
Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Regulated By

Council for German Orthography
Die Taalkommissie, National Languages Committee

Interesting Facts

  • One of the large group of Indo-Germanic languages is German.
  • The second most popular Germanic language spoken today behind English is German language.
  • Afrikaans Language is a mixture of English, Dutch, German, French and some South African language like Xhosa.
  • Afrikaans Language lacks case and gender distinctions.

Similar To

Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish and English Languages
Dutch Language

Derived From

Albanian Languages
Dutch Language

Alphabets

Alphabets in

Alphabets

2632
18 247
👆🏻

Phonology

How Many Vowels

1015
0 32
👆🏻

How Many Consonants

917
9 60
👆🏻

Scripts

Latin
Latin

Writing Direction

Left-To-Right, Horizontal
Left-To-Right, Horizontal

Hard to Learn

Language Levels

63
2 12
👆🏻

Time Taken to Learn

30 weeks24 weeks
3 88
👆🏻

Greetings

Hello

hallo
hallo

Thank You

Danke
Dankie

How Are You?

Wie geht es dir?
Hoe gaan dit

Good Night

gute Nacht
goeie nag

Good Evening

guten Abend
Goeienaand

Good Afternoon

guten Tag
Goeie middag

Good Morning

guten Morgen
goeie more

Please

bitte
asseblief

Sorry

Verzeihung
jammer

Bye

Tschüs
Totsiens

I Love You

Ich liebe dich
Ek het jou lief

Excuse Me

Entschuldigung
Verskoon my

Dialects

Dialect 1

Swiss German
Kaapse Afrikaans

Where They Speak

Switzerland
-

How Many People Speak

4,500,000.007,700,000.00
1.5 960000000
👆🏻

Dialect 2

Swabian German
Oranjeriverafrikaans

Where They Speak

Germany
-

How Many People Speak

820,000.007,700,000.00
700 274000000
👆🏻

Dialect 3

Texas German
Baster Afrikaans

Where They Speak

Texas
Namibia

How Many People Speak

6,000.007.00
2 230000000
👆🏻

Total No. Of Dialects

283
0 188
👆🏻

How Many People Speak

How Many People Speak?

229.00 million19.00 million
0 1200
👆🏻

Speaking Population

1.39 %0.03 %
0 89
👆🏻

Native Speakers

101.00 million7.10 million
0 873
👆🏻

Second Language Speakers

128.00 million10.30 million
0.01 400
👆🏻

Native Name

Deutsch
Afrikaans

Alternative Names

Deutsch, Tedesco
Cape Dutch

French Name

allemand
afrikaans

German Name

Deutsch
Afrikaans

Pronunciation

[ˈdɔʏtʃ]
[ɐfriˈkɑːns]

Ethnicity

Germans
Afrikaners

History

Origin

6th Century AD
17th Century

Language Family

Indo-European Family
Indo-European Family

Subgroup

Germanic
Germanic

Branch

Western
Western

Language Forms

Early Forms

No early forms
Cape dutch or kitchen dutch

Standard Forms

German Standard German, Swiss Standard German and Austrian Standard German
Standard Afrikaans

Language Position

923
1 120
👆🏻

Signed Forms

Signed German
Signed Afrikaans (signs of SASL)

Scope

Individual
Individual

Code

ISO 639 1

de
af

ISO 639 2

ISO 639 2/T

deu
afr

ISO 639 2/B

ger
afr

ISO 639 3

deu
afr

ISO 639 6

deus
afrs

Glottocode

high1287, uppe1397
afri1274

Linguasphere

52-ACB–dl & -dm
52-ACB-ba

Types of Language

Language Type

Living
Living

Language Linguistic Typology

Subject-Object-Verb, Subject-Verb-Object
Subject-Object-Verb

Language Morphological Typology

Fusional, Synthetic
Analytic

German vs Afrikaans Speaking Countries

There are plenty of languages spoken around the world. Every country has its own official language. Compare German vs Afrikaans speaking countries, so that you will have total count of countries that speak German or Afrikaans language.

  • German is spoken as a national language in: Germany.
  • Afrikaans is spoken as a national language in: South Africa.

You will also get to know the continents where German and Afrikaans speaking countries lie. Based on the number of people that speak these languages, the position of German language is 9 and position of Afrikaans language is 23. Find all the information about these languages on German and Afrikaans.

German and Afrikaans Language History

Comparison of German vs Afrikaans language history gives us differences between origin of German and Afrikaans language. History of German language states that this language originated in 6th Century AD whereas history of Afrikaans language states that this language originated in 17th Century. Family of the language also forms a part of history of that language. More on language families of these languages can be found out on German and Afrikaans Language History.

German and Afrikaans Greetings

People around the world use different languages to interact with each other. Even if we cannot communicate fluently in any language, it will always be beneficial to know about some of the common greetings or phrases from that language. This is where German and Afrikaans greetings helps you to understand basic phrases in German and Afrikaans language. German word for "Hello" is hallo or Afrikaans word for "Thank You" is Dankie. Find more of such common German Greetings and Afrikaans Greetings. These greetings will help you to be more confident when conversing with natives that speak these languages.

German vs Afrikaans Difficulty

The German vs Afrikaans difficulty level basically depends on the number of German Alphabets and Afrikaans Alphabets. Also the number of vowels and consonants in the language plays an important role in deciding the difficulty level of that language. The important points to be considered when we compare German and Afrikaans are the origin, speaking countries, language family, different greetings, speaking population of these languages. Want to know in German and Afrikaans, which language is harder to learn? Time required to learn German is 30 weeks while to learn Afrikaans time required is 24 weeks.