Nouns & gender
Every German noun is masculine, feminine or neuter, and every noun is capitalised — always, everywhere in the sentence. Gender is not about biology (das Mädchen, the girl, is neuter); it is a property of the word, so learn the article as part of the noun: not Tisch but der Tisch.
Capitalisation
Ich habe heute Morgen mit meinem Bruder über das Wetter gesprochen.
Any word used as a noun gets a capital, even verbs and adjectives: das Essen (the food, from essen), etwas Neues (something new). This is a genuine spelling rule, not decoration — sie (she) vs Sie (formal you) can only be told apart by it.
Endings that give the gender away
| ending | gender | examples |
|---|---|---|
| -ung, -heit, -keit, -schaft, -ion, -tät, -ie | die (~100%) | die Zeitung, die Freiheit, die Möglichkeit, die Nation |
| -e (two syllables+) | die (~90%) | die Lampe, die Straße — but der Name, der Käse |
| -chen, -lein (diminutives) | das (100%) | das Mädchen, das Brötchen |
| -um, -ment, -nis, Ge- | mostly das | das Museum, das Dokument, das Ergebnis, das Gebäude |
| -er (people, tools), -ling, -ismus | der | der Lehrer, der Computer, der Frühling |
Also der by meaning: days, months, seasons, weather (der Montag, der Juli, der Regen), alcoholic drinks (der Wein — but das Bier). Infinitives used as nouns are das: das Lesen.
Compounds: the last noun rules
German glues nouns together freely; the whole compound takes the gender of the last part — and the stress of the first:
| das Bier + das Glas | das Bierglas |
| die Stadt + der Plan | der Stadtplan |
| der Wein + die Flasche | die Weinflasche |
So you never need to learn a compound's gender — only its final noun's.
Why gender matters so much
The gender itself is silent; what you hear is the article and every adjective bending around it (see Articles):
der alte Mann · die alte Frau · das alte Haus
Get the gender wrong and every case ending downstream goes wrong with it. That is why the only workable habit is: never learn a bare noun — learn die Tür, der Schlüssel, das Fenster, ideally with the plural too (see Plurals).
A small trap: weak masculine nouns
A handful of masculine nouns (people/animals, often in -e) add -(e)n in every case except the nominative: der Junge → Ich sehe den Jungen; der Student → mit dem Studenten. Common ones: Junge, Herr, Mensch, Kunde, Kollege, Name.
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