{"id":93944,"date":"2023-05-30T07:25:57","date_gmt":"2023-05-30T11:25:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fluentu.com\/blog\/learn\/german-punctuation\/"},"modified":"2025-02-26T04:41:52","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T09:41:52","slug":"german-punctuation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fluentu.com\/blog\/german\/german-punctuation\/","title":{"rendered":"German Punctuation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Just like in your native language, you’ll need proper German punctuation to write anything from emails<\/a> to essays<\/a> without driving your reader crazy.<\/p>\n

Luckily, German punctuation marks are practically identical to ones found across other Western languages, especially English<\/a>. Der punkt <\/em>(the period) and das Komma <\/em>(the comma) are just two of the most common punctuation marks in German.<\/p>\n

There are just a handful of important differences, which we’ll teach you in this post to make you a German punctuation pro in no time.<\/p>\n

[fluentu-toc]<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Similarities Between English and German Punctuation<\/h2>\n

\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t
der Punkt<\/em><\/td>period<\/td>.<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
das Komma<\/em><\/td>comma<\/td>,<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
das Fragezeichen<\/em><\/td>question mark<\/td>?<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
das Ausrufezeichen<\/em><\/td>exclamation point<\/td>!<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
der Doppelpunkt<\/em><\/td>colon<\/td>:<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
das Semikolon<\/em><\/td>semicolon<\/td>;<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
der Apostroph<\/em><\/td>apostrophe<\/td>'<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before stressing out about not being able to write in German<\/a>, take a look at what you already know<\/strong>! The Apostroph<\/em>, Komma<\/em>, Semikolon<\/em>\u00a0(apostrophe, comma, semicolon) and other punctuation marks are just some similarities that you may already recognize from the names alone<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Even the punctuation usage is the same as in English in many cases<\/strong>. Our trusty Punkt<\/em> (period) also serves to end sentences in German, items in lists are still separated with the Komma<\/em> (comma) and questions are designated with a Fragezeichen<\/em> (question mark) at the end.<\/p>\n

That said, there are several unique functions that I’ll get into below.<\/p>\n

1. Perfecting the Period<\/h2>\n

Periods get a lot more use in German than in English<\/strong>, where the mark is typically just used to end sentences. As you can see in the example below, this little dot indicates ordinal numbers, tells time and substitutes the comma in numbers past the hundreds.<\/p>\n