German Articles: Der, Die, Das

Level: A1. In German, every noun has a grammatical gender: masculine, feminine or neuter. You can see it in the word for “the” — der, die or das. This page covers the basic (nominative) forms; the articles change in other cases, which come later.

The rule

• der — masculine: der Mann (the man), der Tisch (the table)
• die — feminine: die Frau (the woman), die Lampe (the lamp)
• das — neuter: das Kind (the child), das Buch (the book)
• die — all plurals, whatever the gender: die Tische, die Lampen, die Bücher

Gender is a grammatical label, not a fact about the thing. Learn every noun with its article, and write all German nouns with a capital letter.

Patterns that help

Pattern	Usually	Examples
-ung, -heit, -keit, -schaft, -ion, -tät	die (feminine)	die Zeitung, die Freiheit, die Information, die Universität
-chen, -lein (small things)	das (neuter)	das Mädchen, das Brötchen, das Büchlein
Days, months, seasons	der (masculine)	der Montag, der Mai, der Sommer
-er for people who do something (male / dictionary form)	der (masculine)	der Lehrer, der Fahrer — but die Lehrerin for a woman
Infinitives used as nouns	das (neuter)	das Essen, das Lernen

The suffixes -ung, -heit, -keit, -schaft, -ion, -tät, -chen and -lein are reliable when they are real suffixes; the other rows are tendencies. Many common nouns (der Tisch, die Tür, das Haus) simply have to be learned.

Example sentences

1. Der Mann ist groß. — The man is tall.
2. Die Frau ist Lehrerin. — The woman is a teacher.
3. Das Kind spielt. — The child is playing.
4. Das Mädchen liest. — The girl is reading. (-chen → neuter)
5. Die Zeitung ist neu. — The newspaper is new. (-ung → feminine)
6. Der Montag ist lang. — Monday is long.
7. Die Bücher sind teuer. — The books are expensive. (plural → die)
8. Das Haus ist alt. — The house is old.
9. Der Lehrer ist nett. — The teacher is nice.
10. Die Tür ist offen. — The door is open.

Common mistakes

• ❌ die Mädchen ist hier → ✅ das Mädchen ist hier. Singular Mädchen is neuter; die Mädchen is the plural (“the girls”).
• ❌ der Haus → ✅ das Haus. Learn the article with the noun.
• ❌ das Bücher → ✅ die Bücher. Every plural takes die.
• ❌ die tisch → ✅ der Tisch. Nouns are capitalised.

Compared with…

• English “the” — one form for everything; German has three singular forms plus die for plurals.
• Cases — der/die/das change with the role of the noun in the sentence (den Mann, dem Kind); this comes in a later lesson in the German grammar section.

Quick recap before the quiz.

Mini quiz

1. ___ Zeitung (the newspaper)
2. ___ Brötchen (the bread roll)
3. ___ Mann (the man)
4. ___ Kinder (the children)
5. ___ Freiheit (the freedom)

Answers

1. die — -ung is feminine.
2. das — -chen is neuter.
3. der — masculine.
4. die — all plurals take die.
5. die — -heit is feminine.

Sources

• Rules and forms checked against Duden and the IDS grammis grammar.
• This topic sits at beginner level (A1) in common course sequencing; the CEFR is used as a general reference, not as a topic-level ruling.
• Example sentences were written for this lesson; no third-party sentences were copied.

Next

• Back to the German grammar section
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