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Deutsch German
Standard German as spoken in Germany, with the formal Sie throughout unless a line is explicitly casual.
No card. $19.95 a month afterwards, for German alone.
Hear it
Three lines from the German set
Not samples written for this page — these are blocks from the shipped content, exactly as you would drill them.
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Ich bin Softwareentwickler.I'm a software developer.
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Entschuldigung, haben Sie das auch in einer anderen Größe?Excuse me, do you have this in another size?
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Könnten Sie das bitte wiederholen? Die Verbindung ist schlecht.Could you repeat that, please? The line is bad.Blaming the line is the polite escape hatch — it asks for a repeat without announcing that your German failed. Worth having ready before you need it.
Audio uses your browser's built-in voices. If nothing plays, no German voice is installed on this device — the app says so plainly rather than failing quietly.
What is inside
14 islands
Each is a topic you can hold up on your own for thirty seconds. Build few, drill them past the point of thinking.
- My work Meine Arbeit The second question anyone asks. Have all of it ready cold.
- Why I study German Warum ich Deutsch lerne Fires the moment anyone compliments your German. It always comes.
- My family Meine Familie Rewrite this one first. Wrong details here are worse than none.
- Ordering a meal Im Restaurant Transactional, frequent, unforgiving of hesitation. Drill to reflex.
- Where I live Wo ich wohne Pairs with the work island — somebody always asks where you came from.
- What I do outside work Meine Freizeit The island that keeps a conversation going once the basics are done.
- Getting around Unterwegs You need this while tired and carrying luggage. Overlearn it.
- Shopping Einkaufen Short, frequent exchanges where hesitating costs you the queue.
- Weather and small talk Smalltalk The filler that keeps a silence from becoming awkward.
- Making plans Sich verabreden The moment a conversation could become a second meeting.
- When something goes wrong Wenn etwas schiefgeht The island you will need under stress, which is when improvising fails.
- Opinions and preferences Meine Meinung What turns an interview into a conversation.
- On the phone Am Telefon The one conversation you cannot get through on gestures. Rehearse it until the opening is automatic.
- Officialdom Auf dem Amt Anyone living in Germany meets this within a fortnight. Narrow vocabulary, high cost of fumbling it.
Under pressure
6 staged conversations
Drills tell you which island is coming. These do not — somebody speaks first, and you work out which of your islands answers them.
- Meeting someone at a party A flat party in Berlin. Someone turns from the kitchen counter and starts talking. Three of your islands cover everything he is about to ask — the only question is whether you can reach the right one before the pause gets long. 4 beats
- Dinner for two A busy restaurant at half past seven. The waiter is moving fast and will not slow down for you. Every beat is a sentence you already have — this is a speed test, not a comprehension one. 5 beats
- Small talk on the train Four hours to Munich and the woman opposite has decided to talk. Nothing here is transactional — she is just curious, which means no script fits perfectly and you have to pick the closest island fast. 5 beats
- Making the connection Eleven minutes until your train and the departure board is showing nothing useful. The man at the counter is helpful but fast, and every question you fumble costs you a minute you do not have. 4 beats
- Buying something that fits A department store on a Saturday. The assistant reaches you within seconds, which means the "just looking" line has to be ready before you have decided anything. 4 beats
- Something went wrong Customer service on a Monday morning with a queue behind you. Complaining in a second language is where politeness and clarity pull against each other — these blocks do both at once. 4 beats
How German is graded
Graded word by word, with a near-miss tier for forms.
A dropped umlaut or a lowercase noun is a near miss, not a failure — you reached for the right word and the score says so, while still costing you something. German capitalises its nouns and the grader treats that as meaningful, because it is.
Every drill grades what you actually produced, word by word or character by character, and shows you the exact unit you dropped. The number is there so the scheduler knows what to bring back; the marking is there so you can see what to fix.
Seven days of German, free
No card, nothing to cancel. If the drilling works, it is $19.95 a month for German — and your islands stay yours either way.
Open German