Hello everyone,
And welcome to a new episode of the epic series
How to Sounds more Authentic in German
In this series, I talk about words and phrasings that many learners don’t use often enough and that can make you sound way more authentic.
Sometimes though, it’s the opposite. So I’ll tell you about words and phrasings that many learners use that make you sound LESS authentic. So basically… things to avoid.
Like using scheinen as to seem, for example. Just…. just don’t do it.
And today, I have another “Stop doing this” piece of advice for you and it’s about
How to say “enjoy” in German
So let’s take a look.
How to say “enjoy” in German?
The sad and simple answer is: You don’t.
“enjoying something” is not part of German culture so if you really want to blend in, just avoid this concept alltogether and instead stick with talking about work and how much things cost.
Okay… I’m kidding of course.
What I really want to talk about today is genießen and how you’re probably overusing it, so let’s jump right in.
Stop using only “genießen” as “to enjoy”
genießen is what learners find when they’re looking for how to translate to enjoy.
And technically, it is a translation.
The problem is that you should NOT use genießen the same way you use enjoy in English.
enjoy is really common and used in a very broad range of contexts that are about having a good time. That can be enjoying the silence in the forest, enjoying a movie or enjoying the first round of a 9 step job interview process.
genießen is a lot more specific. It’s a bit hard to describe and if you’re a native speaker reading this, please chime in in the comments if you disagree, but I feel like genießen overall is a bit more active, not in a sense of you being active, but in a sense of you actively enjoying something. You actively take it in, bathe in it. It does sound a bit indulging. Think of a cat getting its belly rub.
And it will sound out of place, if the context is not about that vibe.
- I really enjoyed our meeting and I hope to be working with you soon.
Using genießen here is super duper weird, because what you mean is simply that you had a good time at the meeting.
Same here:
- “How’d you like the movie?”
“Pretty good. I enjoyed it.”
The vibe of the statement is pretty clear… you had a good time watching it. You liked it. But it’s not strong and indulging enough for genießen, and using genießen here just sounds a bit odd, especially when it comes from non-native speakers who say it with an attitude that fits more the general having a good time.
Let’s maybe look at some examples for genießen to get a better sense of how it’s used.
- Maria genießt die Ruhe, wenn abends das Büro leer ist.
- Maria enjoys the silence when the office is empty at night.
- Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
- Ich habe die Massage sehr genossen.
- I really enjoyed the massage.
- Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
- “Können wir kurz wegen dem Projekt telefonieren?”
“Nein!! Ich will heute einfach meinen freien Tag genießen.” - “Can we have a quick call about the project?”
“No!! I just want to enjoy my day off.” - Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
Can you the vibe of this? Maybe think of this image of a cat getting a belly rub while reading the examples. There’s a sense of indulging and chilling in it.
And now, with this “vibe” in mind, let’s look at some examples where it doesn’t really fit.
- “Du warst also Bungee-Springen?”
“OMG, ja, es war mega cool.” - “So you went bungee jumping?”
“OMG, yeah, I really enjoyed it!!” - Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
- “Ich treff mich mit Thomas auf ein paar Bier.”
“Cool, viel Spaß.” - “I’m going to meet Thomas for a few beers.”
“Cool, enjoy.“ - Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
- “Wer kriegt den Whisky Sour?”
“Der ist für mich.”
“Na dann, lass dir schmecken.”
“Danke.” - “Who gets the Whisky Sour?”
“That’s for me.”
“All right, enjoy!”
“Thanks.”
(lit.: “let it taste to you.”)
- Practice pronunciation – click once to start recording and again to stop
As you can see, the translations I used vary.
It does depend on the context but overall.
But I think the following two core re-phrasings already take you quite far.
If you talk about that you enjoyed something in the sense that you liked it:
| Instead of | Say |
|---|---|
| Ich habe es (sehr) genossen. | Es war cool/schön/gut/lecker. (or: Es hat mir gefallen or: Es hat Spaß gemacht… depends on context.) |
If you want to say “Enjoy!” to someone and you basically want to wish them a good time:
| Instead of: | Say: |
|---|---|
| Genieß! | Viel Spaß! |
You might have noticed the latter in my newsletter actually.
I ALWAYS use Viel Spaß in German and Enjoy! in English to really drive that point home – genießen just sounds so out of place in a context like this.
Again… it’s not like genießen is useless.
There are contexts where it fits. But you should not think of it as a default word, but instead of a word that you deliberately choose, if you really want to express the vibe of that mental image of a cat getting a belly rub.
Cool.
Now, there’s probably a bit more that I could say about genießen. If you want, I can make that word of the day at some point and also explore the family a bit.
But for today, we’ve done enough, I think.
I’ll skip the quiz this time because I couldn’t really come up with enough questions and also, the Advent Calendar is coming like next week and that’ll have quizzes aplenty. I think… I actually haven’t prepared anything this time yet, omg.
Anyways, if you have any questions or suggestions about enjoying in German and the use of genießen, just leave me a comment, and I’ll do my best to clear things up.
I hope you… ahem… enjoyed this one. Ich hoffe, es hat euch gefallen.
Have a great week and bis zum nächsten Mal.
Further reading:
- Word of the Day – “der Spaß”
(Older lesson, but lots of stuff about using “Spaß”) - Word of the Day – “nutzen vs benutzen”
(Some information about the origins of “genießen”) - Stop using “scheinen” as “to seem”
The idea that Germans don’t enjoy had me laughing. And cat belly rubs are a trap.
Nice article and good idea of teaching how not to translate literally specific ideas from other languages. I’m surprised though that you didn’t mention the option of “etw. gern machen/tun” among the possible translations. Maybe, after all, it is not used as often as i would have thought ?
Auf jeden Fall, vielen Dank für den Artikel ! Er gefällt mir wirklich gut ;-)
Oh, very true! I honestly forgot about that, because I never use “enjoy” that way. Instead I would just say “I like doing X”.
But now that you mention it, I realize that “enjoy” is indeed used that way and I’ve heard it.
So yeah, “gern machen” is another option. Thanks for adding this!!
Vielen Danke. Im glad I found this. It’s perfect.
Heidi
KLeine Korrektur: Vielen Dank. No “e”. It’s a super common mistake and it sounds really weird :)
I just wrote a card that went with some German books to a friend and used „genießen der Bucher.“ Opps!
Ah, that’s fine :). I would have said “Viel Spaß mit den Büchern” but “genieß” works too. It’s a bit like “savor the books”
“Very helpful discussions here – I enjoyed them!” OK, which German phrase works for that? I could say, “Sie waren sehr hilfreich” but that’s different.
I’d guess that “…, sie haben mir gefallen” would be pretty close, but that comes with a 100% non-native, no-money-back guarantee.
We’d use “Diskussion” in singular, unless the person is talking about a forum like Reddit where there’s a multitude of discussions.
– Sie hat mir gefallen.
This works, but it sounds a tiny bit detached. Like you’re a Reddit thread critic who rates discussion threads. I think the most natural thing for a German to say would be “Das war sehr hilfreich/aufschlussreich/bereichernd/. Vielen Dank!”
I would say something like “Das war interessant zu lesen.”.
Wait! I use “scheinen” quite a bit. What should I be saying instead?
It depends on the context and the phrasing, but “so aussehen” is a common option, especially if you talk about “how someone seems”. “scheinen” is not wrong or anything, it’s just used too much because it is nowhere near as common as “to seem”.
Have you checked my article about it?
I have now! Thanks
Hallo Emanuel
I’ve reached the B2 level finallyyy, and 3 months have already passed.
I’m an indian whose mother tongue is Hindi. Learned English as a secondary language. Now doing German out of my own willingness. To some extent, I’m doing fine with this language- grammar and listening, but while speaking and writing I’m facing problems. It’s like during writing or speaking 2 sides of my brain combine- Hindi side and English side. As a result, I fail to speak or write fluently.
Every day I listen to podcasts, watch cartoons, and news. learning verbs 50 per day. still its not working kinda broken German it feels when I speak or write.
Yes, “Savor” is a pretty good translation.
Genießen to me is something more general , intense and visceral. „Belly crawl“ is pretty good, but where the hell do they say that? Kraulen is German and maybe “belly crawl” grew out of that, but I think it‘s more German than English. In any case, scratching the tummy of most kitties makes them intensely, generally and viscerally happy cats.
Yeah, that was me just translating the way we say it in German using a false friend. We say “Bauch kraulen” and I though “crawl” would work for that and didn’t realize it’s actually a type of moving :).
On a broad spectrum of enjoying, “geniessen” seems roughly to be somewhere between “viel Spass” or “schoenes Wochenende” at one end (mostly suggesting active fun or pursuits), and, at the other end, “chillen” where English speakers might say “vegging out”, ie lazy enjoyment doing nothing in particular. I suppose at a Wellness spa resort, it’s mostly “geniessen” but having a friend around at home for a couple of wasted hours is just “chillen” or “herumhaengen”. But if we decide to go to the beach to have a swim and lie in the sun, is that “chillen” or “geniessen”? Or either?
Enjoying this amazing site almost for an year ! Thought it would be great to share idea about improvemtents. As there are countless articles and people dont exactly read one by one but rather here and there, personally i get lost often what i was reading before and search though browse history. It would be nice to view my reading history such as youtube you know? Just a small idea out ot supporting this site :)
Interesting idea, thanks a lot!!!
Currently, I have a quite long list of things I want to add or improve, so I can’t make any promises, but I’ll definitely consider it and ideas like that are always welcome :)
> Like using scheinen as to seem, for example. Just…. just don’t do it.
Das scheint mir keine gute Idee!
Mir schon ;).
Hallo,
Only one typo :)
“How to Sounds more Authentic in German” (How to Sound more Authentic in German)
Thanks, I think I get the vibe, it is genießen for going to the Thalia cafe and eating a piece of black forest cake though, oder?
Bis bald!
Does „Vergnügen“ fit in here anywhere?
Oh, sure! Often synonymous with “Viel Spass!*
It’s like “Spaß” but sounds more old school and formal to me. I never ever use it.
It all depends on context, I agree.
Very timely article! I was looking for the correct way to say something very similar the other day. How do you say “enjoy” to somebody about food when there is a direct object? “Enjoy your coffee!” – Lass dir dein Kaffee schmecken?
That does work, especially if having the coffee is associated with relaxing and taking a break.
If you’re working in a restaurant, “Guten Appetit” or “Lass dir X schmecken” is better, I would say.
Hi
Isn’t “Lass dir X schmecken” a too informal way for a waiter to address a customer? Not “Lass Ihnen…”
JG
It depends on the type of restaurant and region.
In Berlin, you’re more likely to hear “dir”, but okay I don’t hang out in upper class rich people restaurants. Polite form might be more common there.
Ok Alter, ich habe dich endlich gehört. Wer hat gesagt public-shaming schlimm ist. Es ist sehr nützlich! Ich verspreche…kein “scheinen” mehr.
what? I thought that saying “It seems to us that” – Es scheint uns, dass and “Es scheint, dass” – it seems thaat is normal and even leo dictionary has it as a good translation, I am confused
It’s not wrong, but it sounds like from a book and it’s not how Germans would usually speak, especially in everyday conversation. Leo does not give any indication as to how common a translation is or what register it has.
Es ist nicht so, dass es falsch ist. Es ist einfach ganz typisches Sprachlerner-Deutsch, und ihr wollt ja im Prinzip SprachKÖNNER-Deutsch sprechen.
Mein Kommentar war nur ein Witz. Du hast mir früher dazu (es scheint…) erwähnt. I appreciate reminders and references to past issues. Yes, I do understand that it is correct aber nicht oft in alltags benutzt.
Thanks for the image of the cat. I will think about genießen when my dog rolls over for a tummy scratch.
Sounds to me like the better translation of the verb Geneißen would be “luxuriate”
I’ve never heard that one, actually. Looked it up and yes, there is some overlap, but “genießen” is more common than that one, after all.
Good mental helper for the vibe though, I guess.
Quick note. In English we say a pet gets a “belly rub” or “belly scratch”. It couldn’t receive a belly crawl. That’s when a person gets down on their stomach and pulls themselves across the floor. Thanks for the article!
I was honestly going to say the same thing. The first time I thought it might be a typo but then he said it again.
Also, cats are pretty notorious for not liking their bellies rubbed lol. For most of them it’s a surefire way to get your arm perforated.
But yes, it was a great article.
Oh lo, thanks :)!
German expresses enjoyment somewhat differently from English. What might sound natural in English will frequently sound stilted or strange, at the very least unnatural, in German. For instance, when I was in the States, I would hear “Enjoy your meal!”, which I translated as “Geniesse deine Mahlzeit!”, which sounded odd. In German, I would of course have said simply “Guten Appetit!!” or just “Mahlzeit!”,were it around lunchtime.
Anglophones don’t have to expend as much effort as Germans to enjoy things :D
Good one:-)
For real, not having any equivalent expression or custom to saying “Guten Appetit!” or “Mahlzeit!” has been one of those persistent reverse-culture-shock experiences when I’m back in the States. There’s just this moment of almost existential uncertainty where I’m just like… do… do we eat now? How can we know?
At least in Northern Germany, “Mahlzeit!” sometimes replaces “Guten Tag!” when entering a restaurant at noon.
So one time I was on the good ol’ ICE (I think it was on the way to Berlin) in the quiet car, not too full but definitely some people in there, and this guy (looked like he was from the Indian subcontinent somewhere) gets out his lunch and eats. Fairly normal situation, could have been quieter, but whatever.
And he finishes, and lets out a belch that just echoes up and down the wagon. I mean an absolute work of art of a burp.
Stunned silence for a second or two.
And then a German guy looks over and just totally deadpan goes, “Mahlzeit.”
It was a beautiful little moment somehow.
Lol, I can picture that very well, especially in the “Flüsterwagon” :D