How similar are Swiss German and German German? 

For the first time ever, I found Deutsch softer and easier to speak than another language.

I have a funny story. I was at a restaurant in Berlin with a friend, and there was an Arabic couple sitting just at the next table and speaking German with a very strong Arabic accent. With my friend we could not really understand why they would speak German if they were both Arabic. We then said maybe they are just practicing German. We then started chatting with the couple and found out that they were indeed Swiss and have been speaking Swiss German the whole time.

Whenever she spoke in Swiss dialect I actually needed the English translations ... and I am a German native speaker

German: I sound tough Swiss german: lol

"Today's episode was brought to you by "NOT so Easy German"" :)

Berlin Language School - "Learn German, it's spoken in Germany, Austria and Switzerland!" Austria and Switzerland - "No-one told us!"

Today in "Impossible German"

Claudia was hilarious. I bet her classes are really fun to learn.

Me who's learning German: _HAS A STROKE_

As a french student trying to learn german to work in Switzerland later, I had a panick attack when she started talking 😭

This woman's mood and expression brought me life for a week ahead. She is impossibly funny and amusing, I swear!!! 😂😂

Swissgerman ist NOT based on german as Claudia says in the beginning! It's actually an older form of german, similar to "Mittelhochdeutsch" which was spoken in the medieval. Some more detailled information about the lingustical and historical differences you can find here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-zfX1OFMXUh4.html

Swiss German sounds like a German speaking while being choked

Ihr hättet noch erwähnen sollen, dass Schweizerdeutsch nicht gleich Schweizerdeutsch ist. Je nach Kanton gibt es leicht andere Dialekte.

0:53 Als Deutschlehrerin sollte sie wissen dass das Schweizerdeutsch nicht auf dem heutigen Hochdeutsch basiert sondern sich aus dem Allemannischen parallel dazu entwickelt hat. Deshalb auch die vielen phonetischen Ähnlichkeiten mit Altenglisch.

On the bright side, Swiss French is a bit slower than French in France, whilst being generally the same language. Which is nice.

Also claudia übertrreibt ein bischen mit ihrem Zürcher Deutsch. (Finde ich als Luzerner)

If this worries you, I need to inform you that northern dialects like Basel, Zürich and St. Gallen are comparatively close to standard German. Bern, Wallis, Graubünden etc are a lot harder to understand 😆

I’m a Brit and I’ve lived Switzerland for 10 years and before that I lived in the Netherlands for 9 years, so I can speak Dutch and Schwiizerdütsch (specifically Bärndütsch) but I’ve never learned High German.

Die Episode war sehr interessant und hat viel Spaß gemacht. Danke an euch 👍

Wow, wow, wow - this was so interesting to see and hear for the first time. In 1973 when I was 18/19, I went to Germany to improve my German. I immediately went to work on a farm just south of Hannover. I had 2 years of high school German and 1 year of college German prior to coming to Germany. It was hard for me to learn more German and to improve my German because everybody wanted to practice their English with me, and their English was better than my German. After a month on the farm, I left to hitchhike around Germany. Next, I ended up in southern Germany in Berchtesgaden. What I didn't know is that people in Berchtesgaden don't speak German, they speak a German dialect, which I don't understand. They understood me, but I did not understand them. I loved living and working in Berchtesgaden for about 5 months, but my German wasn't getting much better. Next I headed to where it was warmer, the Canary Islands (Spain). Suddenly, my German began to improve. There were lots of Germans, Austrians, and Swiss on vacation there, and when they are on vacation, they speak German. And they preferred to speak German with me instead of English! I probably spoke more German there than I did in Germany. After a month in the Canaries and Madiera, I headed to eastern Switzerland, to Glarus. There, I stayed with and worked with a middle-aged couple for a couple months. I helped them learn some English, and they mostly understood my high German. I actually thought I was learning some Swiss German, but they were simply trying to speak high German so I could understand them. I loved being in Switzerland. Then I headed back to Berchtesgaden (dialect again) briefly, and then on to northern Germany where I was so relieved to be able to understand German again, and Germans could understand me. And I also realized that my German wasn't that bad after all. It has now been 45 years since I first went to Germany, and I can still speak, read and write in German - I've still kept practicing all these years in between - and now thanks to RU-vid and Easy German! it is easier to do.

I just wanted to further clarify something really quick: While the Swiss German spoken in Zurich is one of the "harsher" dialects, the teacher in this video exaggerated it a lot. It normally sounds much less aggressive, trust me. I've spoken this dialect all my life, and I still live in the canton of Zurich and you never really meet someone who speaks like her. I imagine that she did it to make it more clear that it's often very different form High-German. Ich wollte hier einfach schnell noch etwas erklären: Es ist so, dass der Zürcher Dialekt einer der "härteren" Dialekte ist. Die Lehrerin in diesem Video hat es allerdings übertrieben. Normalerweise klingt der Zürcher Dialekt viel weniger aggressiv, glaubt mir. Ich bin mit diesem Dialekt aufgewachsen und wohne immer noch im Kanton Zürich und man trifft normalerweise niemanden, der so spricht wie sie in diesem Video. Ich denke, sie wollte den Unterschied mehr hervorheben.

Nice content and engaging presentation. Many thanks.

Toll, dass ich wieder auf euer Kanal gestoßen bin. Vor 5 Jahren habe ich angefangen eure Videos zu schauen und habe unheimlich viel gelernt. Freut mich dass ihr immer noch aktiv seid!

Also ich verstehe meine niederländischen Nachbarn besser als die Schweizer

I went from happy and curious to terrified rather quickly. No language has made me that uncomfortable before.

Habe vor 45 Jahren in der Schweiz gearbeitet and habe damals ganz gut Schwitzerduetsch verstanden. Ich bin Englaenderin und man merkt manchmal, dass ich beim Deutschsprechen immer noch einen Schweizerakzent habe! Ich habe Easy German erst vor ein Paar Tagen gefunden und bin davon sehr begeistert!

Wow, that was amazing how different they were and I think it actually helped my German comprehension straining to hear any familiar German words. Great video.

Mir fällt auf, dass jetzt ich als Süddeutscher kein Problem habe, die Schweizer zu verstehen. Es kommt auch darauf an, aus welchem Teil Deutschlands man ist.

It's a lovely language. I was raised abroad and can't speak Swiss German - but I can understand most of it. Still speak High German with a Swiss accent, though. Bamboozles people.

Das hat viel Spaß gemacht. Danke für das Video. 😃 That was a lot of fun. Thanks for the video.

"Natel" is short for "Nationales Autotelefon", the name is from an era when the only mobile phones were built into cars. Like the British "Carphone Warehouse".

Hardcore mode: Walliser Düütsch

Als deutscher kann ich jetzt beruhigt die Schweiz besuchen fahren, denn ich kenne das Wort "Beiz"! Danke Claudia und beste grüße aus dem Norden.

This was such a fun episode, loved it

I had no idea Swiss German was a real different language!!! Totally incomprehensible! Swiss Italian sounds like the accent from Bergamo but they have some different words, that’s all. Still the same language. This is new to me, I always thought Swiss German was to hoch German as swiss Italian is to Italian. In Swiss Italian they also say Natel of course 😂

Also, I like how enthusiastic the Swiss girl is.

Super. Vielen Dank für euren Besuch!

Ein sehr tolles Video!

Sehr interessant! Danke.

If High German and Swiss German are considered the same language then I guess English and the Japanese should be cosidered the same language.

"It's based on High-German", totally not true, Swiss-German belongs to the Alemannic Dialect group and with that the language/dialect we call Swiss-German is way older than High-German or even Germany itself.

Great video! Danke euch!

Sehr, sehr interessant. Danke fūrs Posting! 💐🎄

The very first word I've learnt in Swiss German was 'Stangä' 🍺. I think this is the most important one ;)

Why does it sound so aggressive?! Hochdeutsch sounds so musical next to Swiss deutsch 😅

Echt super, danke!!!

Das ist ein toll video Danke Ihnen ❤

I studied German for many years. In UK Austria and Germany. Vienna Innsbruck and Frankfurt. But was always confused in Switzerland. I could not understand any of it. But also noticed Germans and Austrians have a similar problem with Swiss German. We even had a Swiss man's in Vienna learning German as he needed to improve his hoch Deutsch. Tschüss aus England.

I lived in northern Germany a year in college. At the end of the year I was at a party where I didn't know anyone but the hosts. I was speaking to some people I had never met before on the balcony. One of the went inside to ask the host who "the Swiss guy" on the balcony is. The host was momentarily confused before realizing he meant me, an American. It was a proud moment for me convincing a native German speaker that I was a native speaker. However, now I'm worried he didn't understand me at all and was just being nice haha

Wenn es jemand interessiert. Natel kommt nicht von der Swisscom, sondern ist die Abkürzung für: "N ationales A utomobil TEL efon". Und kommt daher das die ersten Natel's fix im Auto eingebaut wurden. Sie brauchten auch fast den ganzen Kofferraum und die Mittelkonsole musste ausgetauscht werden. Da kam dann ein Hörer mit Anschlusskabel hin 🙂

To me, an American, as Claudia was speaking Swiss-German, it sounded almost like she was speaking Swedish, or Norwegian. It kind of had those inflections. Very, very interesting exchange!!

Hi Carina, I find this video extremely amusing because we are living these examples daily. My wife comes from east Germany (1 hour from Berlin) and myself from San Diego. We are now living in Bern, the dialect here is Bernese. Its interesting and amusing because I have been taking German for a while now, I understand it well but struggle with speaking and I feel its getting worse (I just watched episode 79 before this) and not progressing or as quickly as I would like. I talk with people at work and they also tell me that often people are now forgetting high German because they speak in Bernese. This also makes it extremely hard to learn. When I return to the states to visit family I am surrounded by people who don't understand how different Swiss German is vs high German, they often ask how my German is coming and sadly I often reply its getting worse. I will take into light episode 79 and try to set time aside to focus on good learning. I recently subscribed and hope to continue your videos. Evan

*For REAL fun you should have had someone speaking "WALLISERDEUTSCH..!!"* 😂😂😂

That's an excellent school thank you very much 💗 💗💗 laughed a lot!

Your simply amazing people, in an amazing youtube channel. Thanks

I would like to see how similar Austrian/Bavarian German is to Swiss German next time please!!!!

I learned german when I lived in Switzerland for a year, ten years ago. In my country almost no one speaks german, so I found this Easy German videos very educative so I could practice it again. When I listened to this video, with the swiss german greeting, it instantly gave me chills as to remember the so loved swiss german! A hug to all the loving people of Switzerland and Germany

Tolles Video. Hatte als gebürtiger Deutschschweizer einen grossen Spass dran. War sehr interessant! Kann allem zupflichten.

As a German I'm having a lot of trouble understanding Swiss German. When I went to France to study French, there were a lot of Swiss people at my language school. I'd understand them a lot better when they were speaking French instead of Swiss German.

Please tell the Swiss lady to turn off CAPS when reading the lines.

Holy god, Swiss German sounds more like Icelandic for me, than German itself. Great video, was nice to discover how it actually sounds :D

Very nice information ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

I’ve always wondered the answer to this question because my great grandpa wrote about this in his journal. My great grandparents immigrated from Switzerland to Idaho. They taught their children their language and so one time my great grandpa wrote complaining that he was expected to communicate to some people in German but they spoke “High German” and he couldn’t understand them as well.

Cooles Video! Ich selber bin auch von der Schweiz, muss aber sagen, dass ich von Bern komme also auch total anders spreche als Züridütsch (Zürcherdeutsch)😅 Hier ein paar Unterschiede: (ZRH-BERN) Grüezi! - Grüessech! sAuto - ds Outo de Chübel - dr Ghüder(chübu) Ich gang abä. - I ga achä/abä. Vo wo chömet Sie? - Vo wo chömet Dir? Chum, mir müend pressiere! - Chumm mir müesse pressiere! Ich het gern en Kafi. - I hätt gärn es Kafi. Ich gang go schlafe. - I ga ga schlafe. Ich han de Hitzgi. - I ha ds Glugsi.

Dutch is really easier to understand than Swiss deutsch :) Nice video

I am from Saarland and we also have this words: pressieren, schaffe, Trottwar, de Bub, luck emool, Hanhnewasser etc. ;) I think I will be very good in understanding swiss :)

Great segment.

Ich bin Schweizerin und spreche auch den Zürcher Dialekt und ich muss sagen dass Schweizerdeutsch bei ihr aggressiv tönt. Die wenigsten sprechen so wie sie, weil Schweizerdeutsch tönt eigentlich gar nicht aggressiv. Man hätte jede andere Person auf der Strasse nehmen können und diese Person hätte wahrscheinlich nicht so gesprochen wie sie.

I'm American and went to Interlaken for a day, and was very happy that everyone I spoke with understood my Hochdeutsch, because I had no idea what they were saying in their dialect. XD

Das war GOLD! Super VIdeo.

I liked the "Lut mir a..." That sounded so cool :)... and the "lueg mal" :)

There are some sounds in Swiss German that remind me of Dutch.

Zum Zürcher Dialekt, der relativ einfach ist, müsste man den Berner und den Walliser Dialekt erwähnen, die noch viel schwerer zu verstehen für ein Deutsche wäre. In Bern gibt es mehr französische Ableitungen, der Walliser Dialekt ist oft sehr schwer zu verstehen, auch für uns Schweizer.

Great video!

As a belgian i understand more with subtitles because it looks like they did the same as we did with dutch with some french infuelnces, but if they talk fast i dont understand anything anymore

small Tipp: before speaking Swiss make sure you have eaten something, it's a hard language you need more calories.

Very different. Try learning high German in somewhere like Bern. It's a nightmare. They only teach you High German, but then none of the locals want to speak it with you. So you're left with a language that is fairly useless for everyday conversation and socialising with the locals. Zürich is fairly benign in comparison. Could be worse though. Could be Wallis ;)

Oh my god, Janus' listening test, that expression. Absolutely pissed myself.

Das ist mal ein cooles Video. Ich lebe seit der Geburt in Deutschland und beherrsche dementsprechend die deutsche Sprache. Finde eure Videos aber trotzdem interessant und gucke sie zur Unterhaltung - seid halt sehr sympathisch und lässig. Bin interessiert an Holländisch und Schweizer deutsch. Könnt ihr da Channels empfehlen? :)

There are definitely words in Swiss-German that ring a bell with me being Dutch. The most obvious is ‘hoi’ for hello because we use that exact same word.

Natel kommt eigentlich von der Konzession als "Nationales Auto-TELefon" - damit bezeichnet wird der ursprüngliche Verwendungszweck bevor die Handys handy wurden.

Great fun, thanks from Tasmania

Als Schweizerin aus dem deutschsprachigen Raum habe ich immer Hochdeutsch bevorzugt. Auch wenn wir neben Schweizerdeutsch Hochdeutsch lernen, sind viele Menschen in unserer Region eher an den lokalen Dialekt gewöhnt. Persönlich habe ich seit meiner Jugend Freunde aus Österreich, Luxemburg und Deutschland. Schweizerdeutsch ist mit Österreichisch oder Hochdeutsch nicht immer verständlich, daher bin ich es gewohnt, Hochdeutsch mit ihnen zu sprechen, um Verwirrung zu vermeiden.

I lived in Switzerland for a while and they suggested (my employers) I continue learning hoch Deutsch but I found that there was a kind of wall between me and Swiss people when I spoke high German and when I tried Swiss German, they put down their guards....they became more comfortable with me. Therefore, I think it would have been better for me to learn a lot more Swiss German, I would have made more Swiss friends.

I'm from the south of Germany and worked in Switzerland for two years and had no problems understanding the dialect after I learned a couple special words like Znüni (very important in an office). I even had to learn Swiss German because it's practically impossible to make friends when speaking High German.

3:25 "ich muess go schaffa" Thats exactly how you say it in Pennsylvania Dutch too.

I love all these beautiful sounds from both speakers 😍

Oh yaaay! You are finally in Switzerland! Welcome! 🇨🇭 Cant wait for the next video!!

Cari: Handy is gar kein englishes wort Ich: Es ist aber schau nicht in das urban dictionary...

I am moving to Switzerland permanently in 5 months after spending 12 months in Germany (Konstanz) and 8 months in Austria (Graz). Being only 18 when I moved over here from Australia, I feel as if I was able to absorb the language quite well, especially since I was fresh out of Highschool and I was still in the mode where I study and absorb information. Whilst living in Konstanz, which is on the border of Switzerland, I was greatly exposed to many Swiss people and their dialect, including meeting my now boyfriend. We did have a long distance relationship whilst I lived in Austria, but I am super excited to move to Switzerland to be with him. I just already know that my greatest challenge will be the language. I’ve been studying German for 12 months now and am about to start B2 level, so I have a good understanding of high German, and as I said before, I do have exposure to Swiss German, especially when I am at my boyfriends house and his whole family are speaking it around me. I picked up on a lot of south german (badisch / schwäbisch) dialect when I lived in Konstanz which I believe will help me in the long run. I also have learnt so much Austrian dialect which , luckily enough, shares a lot of words and phrases with Swiss German. Watching videos from this channel has helped me so much, and I love to practise my listening comprehension with them. I can’t even begin to say how much German I have picked up from these videos. I especially love the dialect videos!

Thank you very much, fun video, I never thought that so much different from German and Swiss. I work in tourist biz , sometime I heard this but I could not understand at all puzzles me.

This video is just amazing. Your channel is amazing! :) also I love the swiss girl’s energy

Hoi zäme, ich bin Norddeutscher und lebe seit einigen Jahren in der Schweiz. Eigentlich habe ich die Dialekte recht schnell verstanden, aber sprechen tue ich immer noch Hochdeutsch weil es sich für mich falsch anhört wenn ich mir einen auf Schwizerdütsch abbreche. Übrigens Natel kommt glaubs vom "Nationalem Auto TELefon" Lustige Sätze wären auch noch mit Paprika/Peperoni, Wischen/Fegen usw. da gibts Lustige Verwechslungen ;-) Und das war jetzt nur "Zürcher Dialekt", den versteht man als Deutscher noch am besten.

Ja schön, da versteh ich zum Glück alles. Im Berndeutschen ist mir das Wort "Handy" auch schon begegnet, das gibt's also nicht nur in Deutschland.

Cool! Vielen Dank

I thought German was hard enough to study, only to find out there is an idiom called "Swizziduscht" and now I'm like "should I rather learn knitting???" 😁😁

This so animal and wild and disturbingly exotic.

That was absolutely total fun!! Na ja, das hat mir absolut und total Spaß gemacht!! Ich bedanke mich!!

This video is awesome. Claudia is amazing!