Svenska

I’m learning Swedish. Keeping track of what words I know is kinda handy, as well as the little ways I’ve used to remember how to spell them.

This isn’t an exhaustive list of stuff I’ve learned, some of them are easy enough to keep in memory, these are just the ones I have occassional trouble remembering, or remembering how to spell them.

This is mostly here for my own reference, so if you found this page, good sleuthing I guess?

General rules and notes

å, ä, ö

These are considered their own letters in Swedish, not a/o with diacritics added.

• å = pronounced like ‘oa’ in ‘oar’
• ä = pronounced like ‘eeh’
• ö = pronounced like ‘uuh’

They come after the the 26 English alphabet characters in terms of sorting order.

‘en’ vs. ‘ett’

‘en’ is used for common gender nouns. ‘ett’ is used for neutral gender (neuter) nouns. There is no hard or fast rule for what nouns use which gender—you just need to memorise them.

This is necessary for definite articles, where the gender affects the suffix of the word.

e.g. en hund (a dog) → hunden (the dog)
e.g. ett bi (a bee) → biet (the bee)

It is also used for adjective agreement.

e.g. en bil (a car) → en stor bil (a big car)
e.g. ett hus (a house) → ett stort hus (a big house)

And both together: e.g. stort huset (the big house)

Plurals

Most gendered nouns are pluralised by suffixing them with -ar.

e.g. jordgubbe (strawberry) → jordgubbar (strawberries)
e.g. tidning (newspaper) → tidningar (newspapers)
e.g. pojke (boy) → pojkar (boys)

Female gendered nouns may be suffixed with -or.

e.g. kvinna (woman) → kvinnor (women)
e.g. flicka (girl) → flickor (girls)

Neuter nouns do not change for their plural forms, so quantity must be determined by context.

e.g. bi (bee or bees)
e.g. brev (letter or letters)

Definitive plurals

Gendered definitive plurals are additionally suffixed by -na.

e.g. jordgubbar (strawberries) → jordgubbarna (the strawberries)
e.g. pojkar (boys) → pojkarna (the boys)
e.g. kvinnor (women) → kvinnorna (the women)

Neuter definitive plurals are suffixed by -en, instead of the -et that their definitive forms usually use.

e.g. biet (the bee) → bien (the bees)
e.g. brevet (the letter) → breven (the letters)

Capitalisation

Other than the first letter of a sentence, only proper nouns (those of people, places, and brand names) are typically capitalised. Other nouns are always lower case.

e.g. de pratar engelska i England (they speak English in England)
e.g. jag är i Norge på juli (I am in Norway in July).

Abbreviations are also capitalised.

Punctuation

Generally speaking, punctuation rules are mostly the same as in English.

Quotation marks

Quotation marks use ‘end’ quotations at both the start and end of the quote.

e.g. ”Hej! Jag heter är beeps.”

Some historical or ‘fancy’ cases use inward pointing guillemets instead of quotation marks.

e.g. »Hej! Jag heter är beeps.«

Abbreviations

Abbreviations are truncated by use of a colon separating the first and last letters.

e.g. Sankt (Saint) can be shortened to S:t, such as in S:t Eriksplan

For ordinal numbers, the number is used instead of the first letter

e.g. tredje (third) can be shortened to 3:e

Colons are also used to separate suffixes (such as defintives, plurals, and posessives) where they may affect the reading.

e.g. b:et (the B)
e.g. CD:n (the CD)
e.g. USA:s (USA’s)

Dates and times

Dates are typically written as YYYY-MM-DD in modern documents. Times are written in the 24-hour clock, separated by a colon or period.

e.g. 2025-08-28 på 22:57

The expanded date format includes the day and month name in an order similar to British English.

e.g. torsdag 28 augusti 2025 (Thursday 28 August 2025)

Numbers

Numbers use a space to separate thousands and a comma to separate decimals.

e.g. 12 345,67

Currency

Sweden no longer issues physical currency in decimal amounts, the smallest coin value being 1 kr, but prices may still be fractional for the purposes of digital payments.

The Swedish kroner can be abbreviated to ‘kr’ or to ‘SEK’. Both may appear before or after the value, separated by a space. ‘kr’ typically comes after, whereas ‘SEK’ comes before.

e.g. 29,50 kr
e.g. SEK 29,50

Foreign currency symbols appear after the value, separated by a space.

e.g. 9,99 €
e.g. 9,99 £

Weights and measures

Metric weights and measures use the same names and abbreviations as in English.

e.g. 25 kg
e.g. 42 cm
e.g. 2 l

Imperial weights and measures use different names. Other than English stone, they are not abbreviated.

e.g. 5 fot (5 feet)
e.g. 6 tum (6 inches)
e.g. 82 pund (82 pounds)
e.g. 22 uns (22 ounces)
e.g. 12 eng. sten (12 English stone)

Common phrases

English	Svenska	Note
welcome	välkommen	Welcome VALerie
sorry	förlåt	pronounced like ‘forlorn’
excuse me	ursäkta	U R sakta
please, thank you	tack
thank you so much	tack så mycket
you’re welcome	varsågod	formal?
you’re welcome	tack tack	informal?, essentially ‘thank you for thanking me’
[statement], right?	[statement], eller hur?	lit. ‘or what?’
cool!	häftigt!
help	hjälp
on the way	på vag	lit. ‘on move’
what is your name?	vad heter du?	lit. ‘what called you?’
there is…	det finns…	lit. ‘there exists…’

Questions

Questions are formed by moving the verb to the start of the sentence.

e.g. du förstår svenska (you understand Swedish) → förstår du svenska? (lit. understand you swedish?)

e.g. du bor i centrum (you live in downtown) → bor du i centrum? (lit. live you in downtown?)

Connecting words

English	Svenska	Note
very	väldigt	val digs it
maybe	kanske	‘can she?’ maybe
but	men
with	med
as, so	så
to, on	på
from	från

Pronouns

English	Svenska	Note
I	jag
you	du, ni
we	vi
he	han
she	hon
they	de
it	den, det	‘den’ for gendered, ‘det’ for neuter

du vs. ni

Historically, ‘du’ is informal whereas ‘ni’ is formal. In the modern day, however, ‘du’ is used almost universally.

‘Ni’ remains as an optional way of showing deference and respect, and is more common in rural or traditional settings.

Posessive pronouns

English	Svenska (en)	Svenska (ett)	Svenska (plural)
my	min	mitt	mina
(my) own	sin	sitt
your (singular)	din	ditt	dina
your (plural)	er	ert	era
our	vår	vårt	våra
his	hans	—	—
hers	hennes	—	—
their (singular)	hens	—	—
their (plural)	deras	—	—
its	dess	—	—

Verbs

Verbs can be reversed by adding ‘inte’ after them.

e.g. du äter choklad (you are eating chocolate) → do äter inte choklad (you are not eating chocolate)

The actual prefix ‘to’ is ‘att’ for verbs. If a sentence is to begin with the verb (i.e. it is not being said about a specific subject) then start the sentence with ‘att’.

English	Svenska (present)	Note
to eat	äter
to drink	dricker
to let	låt
to like	tycker om	lit. ‘think about’
to love	älskar	I love Alaska-r
to work	arbetar	ar beta r
to need	behöver	like ‘behoove’
to have [to]	får
to look	kolla	holla at that thing
to watch	tittar på	lit. ‘looking on’
to follow	följa	Följa Boy tellem
to speak	talar	Tellarites speak
to laugh	skratta
to see	ser
to buy	köp
to own	äger
to make, to do	göra
to understand	förstår	understanding four stars
to think, to intend	tänker	think tank-er
to invite, to treat	bjuda
to play	spelar	playing a spelling game
to study	pluggar	plugs away at
to clean	städar
to wake up	vaknar	like ‘wake now’
to shower	duschar	like ‘does shower’
to bake	bakar
to read	läser	laser scanning a book?
to write	skriva
to paint	målar
to work out/exercise	tränar	like ‘trainer’
to dance	dansar	Ted Dansen dances, Ted Dansar
to go camping	tältar	like ‘tent-er’
to go sailing	seglar	like ‘sailor’
to go swimming	simmar	Sims shouldn’t go swimming
to do business	affär	business affairs

Adjectives

Adjectives can be reversed by adding ‘inte’ before them.

e.g. att skriva svenska är lätt (to write Swedish is easy) → att skriva svenska är inte lätt (to write Swedish is not easy)

English	Svenska	Note
good	bra	what’s good, brah?
new	ny, nytt
easy	lätt	latte’s are easy
small	liten	little kitten :3
sweet, cute	söt
scary	skrämmande	scary things make you ‘scram, man’
big	stor	a big store
tall	lång	like ‘long’
fat	fet, tjock
thin	tunn	does not weigh a tunn
hungry	hungrig
scary	skrämmande	scary things make you want to ‘scram and…’
quiet	tyst	quietly ‘tyst tyst’
cheap	billig
expensive	dyr	‘dear’
old	gammal	gammons are old
young	ung

Directions

English	Svenska	Note
here	här
there	där
nearby	närheten	‘near heart’
on the right	till höger	lit. ‘to right’
on the left	till vänster	lit. ‘to left’
over there	där borta	lit. ‘there away’
far away	långt borta	lit. ‘long away’

Adverbs

English	Svenska	Note
home	hemma
happy	lyckligt	‘lick light’
early	tidigt
always [verb]	[verb] alltid	‘all time’?
often [verb]	[verb] ofta	often
sometimes [verb]	[verb] ibland	Apple sometimes releases a bland thing, the iBland
never [verb]	[verb] aldrig

Nouns

Posessive nouns

Posessive plurals are suffixed with an -s. Unlike English, there is no apostrophe separating it.

e.g. flickas mat (girls’s food)
e.g. mannens hund (the man’s dog)

People

English	Svenska	Svenska (definitive)	Note
friend	(en) vän	vännen	a van full of friends
woman	(en) kvinna	kvinnan
women	kvinnor	kvinnorna
man	(en) man	mannen
men	män	männen
girl	(en) flicka	flickan
girls	flickor	flickorna
boy	(en) pojke	pojken
boys	pojke	pojkarna
child	(ett) barn	barnet
children	barn	barnen

Places

English	Svenska	Svenska (definitive)	Note
apartment	(en) lägenhet	lägenheten	lager hut?
the centre, downtown	centrum
bus stop	(en) busshållplats	busshållplatsen	‘bus hall plat(form)s’
airport	(en) flygplats	flygplatsen	‘fly g plat(form)s’
bakery	(ett) bageri	bageriet
market	(en) marknad	marknaden
grocery store	mataffär		‘mat affair’ lit. ‘food business’
university	universitet
church	kyrka
castle	borg
-ö	island
-å	river
Gothenberg	Göteborg		🐐🤖
Sweden, Swedish	Sverige, Svenska		pronounced like ‘so very uh’
Great Britain, British	Storbritannien, Brittisk		Big Britannia
Norway, Norwegian	Norge, Norska

Food & drink

English	Svenska	Note
food	mat
meal	måltid
breakfast	frukost	like ‘fruit toast’
dinner	middag	dinner is not at midday
soup	soppa	sopping wet soup
salad	sallad	two Ls
apple	äpple
orange	apelsin	derived from ‘apple’ + ‘Sino’ = Chinese apple
strawberry	jordgubbe
Danish pastry	wienerbröd	lit. ‘Vienna bread’
sandwich	smörgås
chicken	kyckling	chickens be kicking?
pork	fläskkött	lit. ‘flesh meat’
beef	nötkött	lit. ‘cattle meat’
ice cream	glass	not ‘glas’, which means glass
oil	olja	not to be confused with ‘öl’ for beer

Objects

English	Svenska	Note
desk	skrivbord	scribe board, lit ‘(to) write table’
refrigerator	kylskåp	Kyle’s cap
bed	säng	sang to sleep
bag	väska	you gotta vask for a bag
money	pengar
ticket	biljett	need a ticket to get on a jett
book	bok
letter	brev	a brief letter
newspaper	tidning
fork	gaffel	eat a waffel with a fork
knife	kniv
spoon	sked	a food sled
plate	tallrik	Tall Rick
cup	kopp

Jobs

English	Svenska	Note
web developer	webbutvecklare	web but veck lare
engineer	ingenjör	in gen jor
doctor	läkare	doctors are care
teacher	lärare	teachers are rare
actor	skådespelare	ska despel are - actors despel?
farmer	bonde	James Bond retires to become a farmer
boss	chef	Yes chef
cook, chef	cock

Activities

English	Svenska	Note
football	fotboll	one O, two Ls
chess	schack	school hack
holiday	semester
travel	resa
business trip	affärsresa	A fars resa

Animals

All animals use ‘en’, but the word ‘animal’ itself uses ‘ett’.

English	Svenska	Note
animal, the animal	djur, djuret	deer is animal
pet, the pet	husdjur, husdjuret	lit. ‘house animal’
ant, the ant	myra, myran
bat, the bat	fladdermus, fladdermusen	like ‘flapper mouse’
bear, the bear	björn, björnen
bee, the bee	bi, biet	ends in ‘et’ because it’s ett bi
crab, the crab	krabb, krabban
(roe) deer, the deer	rådjur, rådjuren	ro-djur
duck, the duck	anka, ankan
dragon, the dragon	drake, draken
elephant, the elephant	elefant, elefanten	ele fan ten
hippo, the hippo	flodhäst, flodhästen	like ‘flood hast’
horse, the horse	häst, hästen	horse goes fast = hast
lion, the lion	lejon, lejonen	spelled like ‘legion’, said like ‘leon’
moose, the moose	älg, älgen	like elk, pronounced like ‘elg’
mouse, the mouse	mus, musen
penguin, the penguin	pingvin, pingvinen
reindeer, the reindeer	ren, renen	ren deer
sheep, the sheep	får, fåren	the sheep are far away
spider, the spider	spindel, spindeln	spiders spin webs
squirrel, the squirrel	ekorr, ekorren	squirrels like acorns (‘ekorren’)
turtle, the turtle	sköldpadda, sköldpaddan	‘scold paddle’?

Times

English	Svenska	Note
night	natt
morning	morgon
tomorrow	i morgon	lit. ‘in morning’

Other notes

Too many men

Lots of words are variations on man/men so I wanted to pull them out for ease of reference.

English	Svenska
man, husband	man
men, husbands	män
the man	mannen
the men	männen
but	men