Why does every text in German feel 37% longer than in English?

At some point, almost every German learner has the same experience:

You receive an email in German.

You open it confidently.

And suddenly it looks like someone wrote a short novel.

Meanwhile, the English version somehow feels half as long.

So… is German actually longer than English?

Short answer: often, yes. But there’s a reason for it — and it’s actually quite interesting 😊

1. German LOVES long words

English:

train station

German:

Hauptbahnhof

English:

health insurance company

German:

Krankenversicherungsgesellschaft

German has a special talent:

Instead of creating several small words, it prefers building one giant superword that looks mildly aggressive.

Sometimes German words look less like vocabulary and more like someone accidentally fell asleep on the keyboard.

2. The verb likes to disappear until the very end

English is usually very direct:

“I think that this is a good idea.”

German says:

“Ich denke, dass das eine gute Idee ist.”

The problem?

Your brain has to wait patiently until the end to finally discover what is happening.

German sentence structure sometimes feels like a Netflix series: you don’t fully understand the situation until the final episode.

3. German likes precision. A lot.

English speakers often communicate more loosely.

German likes details.

For example:

English:

“I’ll come tomorrow.”

German:

“Ich komme morgen gegen 14 Uhr kurz vorbei.”

Not just tomorrow.

Not just coming.

But approximately when, for how long, and probably through which entrance.

German often tries to make things extremely clear and precise — especially in written communication.

4. Formal German can sound… very formal

Many learners first meet German through official letters.

Which means they see things like:

“Bezüglich Ihrer Anfrage teilen wir Ihnen Folgendes mit…”

instead of simply:

“Here’s the information.”

Unfortunately, German bureaucracy is not famous for its minimalist writing style 😅

5. German connectors create marathon sentences

German LOVES words like:

• obwohl

• deshalb

• allerdings

• beziehungsweise

• dennoch

And somehow one sentence suddenly becomes:

• a paragraph

• a life journey

• an emotional experience

But here’s the good news:

Once you understand how German is structured, long texts stop feeling so scary.

And suddenly German starts feeling less chaotic and much more logical 😊

Honestly, sometimes it’s not that German is harder.

It’s just… dramatically committed to detail.