12 Common English Mistakes German Speakers Make (And How to Fix Them)

If you grew up speaking German, your English is almost certainly better than you give yourself credit for. But over years of lessons I've noticed the same dozen mistakes come up again and again, not because German speakers are careless, but because German quietly pushes you toward them. Once you can see why each one happens, it stops happening. Here are the twelve I correct most often, each with a real German example and a fix you can start using today.

1. "Become" doesn't mean bekommen

This is the classic, and it produces some genuinely funny sentences. In German, bekommen means "to get" or "to receive." It looks and sounds so much like the English become that your brain reaches for the wrong one, but English become means "to turn into."

How to fix it: whenever you want to say you're receiving or ordering something, reach for get or have. Save become for real transformations: "It's becoming cold," "She became a doctor."

2. Verb-second word order ("Yesterday went I…")

German is a "verb-second" language: the conjugated verb likes to sit in the second slot, so when a sentence starts with a time word, the subject jumps after the verb. English almost never does this, it holds firmly to subject → verb.

The same thing happens with "now," "then" and "today": "Jetzt gehe ich nach Hause" becomes "Now go I home" if you translate word-for-word.

How to fix it: after any opening time phrase, pause and make sure the subject comes next, then the verb. "Then I called her." "Today we have a meeting." Subject first, always.

3. "Must not" is not muss nicht

This one matters, because getting it wrong can flip your meaning to the opposite. German "Du musst nicht" means "you don't have to", it removes an obligation. But English must not is a strong prohibition: "you are forbidden to."

How to fix it: to say something isn't necessary, use don't have to or don't need to. Keep must not / mustn't for real rules: "You mustn't smoke here."

4. Forgetting the "-ing" (present continuous)

German has no separate continuous tense, one present form covers both "I do" and "I am doing," often with a little word like gerade for "right now." So German speakers naturally drop the English -ing form and use the simple present for actions happening at this moment.

How to fix it: if the action is happening now or around now, use am/is/are + -ing. Keep the simple present for habits and facts: "I read every evening" (habit) vs "I'm reading right now" (this moment).

5. "Since" vs "for"

German uses one word, seit, for both a starting point and a length of time. English splits them: since + a point in time, for + a duration.

Notice the second half of the fix, too: because the situation started in the past and is still true, English wants the present perfect ("I've lived"), not the present ("I live"). German's present tense here trips people twice.

How to fix it: ask "point or period?" A point on the calendar (Monday, 2020, this morning) → since. A stretch of time (five years, two weeks, ages) → for.

6. "Make" vs "do"

German covers both with machen, so the split feels arbitrary. A rough rule that works most of the time: use do for tasks, jobs and activities, and make for creating or producing something.

German makes this genuinely hard, "einen Fehler machen" is "make a mistake," but "die Hausaufgaben machen" is "do the homework," and the same verb machen sits behind both.

How to fix it: don't translate; learn the common pairs as fixed phrases (collocations). "Make a decision," "do a favour," "make dinner," "do your best", memorise them as chunks and you'll stop guessing.

7. Capitalising nouns mid-sentence

In German, every noun gets a capital letter, das Haus, die Musik, das Essen. In English, we capitalise only names, places, days, months and the word "I." When a German speaker writes "I like Music and Food," it reads as slightly off to a native, almost like the words are shouting.

How to fix it: when you write in English, capitalise proper nouns only. If it's not a specific name (Berlin, Monday, Anna, English), it stays lowercase.

8. The "th" sound (and the w/v swap)

German simply doesn't have the English th, so it often turns into "z," "s" or "d": think becomes "sink," this becomes "dis." The fix is physical, not mental, put the tip of your tongue lightly between your teeth and breathe out for think, three, thank, then add your voice for this, that, mother.

The other famous one is w vs v. German "w" is pronounced like an English "v," so wine can come out as "vine." Then, over-correcting, some speakers push "v" toward "w", turning vest into "west."

How to fix it: practise minimal pairs out loud, wine/vine, west/vest, worse/verse. A few minutes a day in front of a mirror does more than any amount of reading about it.

9. "Information" and "advice" are uncountable

In German, Informationen is happily plural and you can say ein Ratschlag ("an advice"). English treats both information and advice as uncountable, no plural "s," and no "a/an" in front.

The same goes for furniture, luggage, news and knowledge, all uncountable in English.

How to fix it: when you need to count them, use "a piece of": a piece of information, a piece of advice, a piece of furniture.

10. False friends: actually, eventually, also

A whole family of English words looks like a German word but means something different. Three cause trouble almost daily:

That last one is sneaky: German speakers love to start a sentence with "Also…" meaning "So…", but in English "Also…" means "In addition…", which confuses the listener.

How to fix it: for aktuell say "currently" or "right now"; for eventuell say "maybe" or "possibly"; and to open a thought, use "So," not "Also." (I've written a full guide to these, see the link at the bottom.)

11. Present perfect where English wants the past simple

Spoken German uses the Perfekt (ich habe gemacht) for almost any past action, even one with a clear finished time. Transferred straight into English, that produces the single most common German-speaker error I hear.

The rule in English: a finished time word (yesterday, last week, in 2019, two hours ago) forces the past simple. The present perfect is for unfinished time or results that matter now.

How to fix it: if you can point to when it happened and that time is over, use the past simple. I've written a whole article on this one, it's worth ten minutes.

12. Small prepositions and sounding too direct

Two smaller habits round out the list. First, tiny prepositions rarely translate one-to-one: "Wie heißt das?" becomes "How is it called?" instead of the natural "What's it called?"; "auf dem Bild" becomes "on the picture" instead of "in the picture"; and "im Fernsehen" becomes "in the television" instead of "on TV."

Second, German phrasing can sound blunt when translated directly. "Gib mir den Bericht" as "Give me the report" is grammatically fine but lands as an order. English softens requests with a modal and "please."

How to fix it: learn prepositions inside real phrases rather than singly, and default to "Could you…?" or "Would you mind…?" for requests. It's a tiny change that makes you sound noticeably warmer.

If you fix even three or four of these, your English will instantly sound more natural, not because your grammar was "bad," but because you've stopped letting German steer. And the fastest way to make the fixes automatic isn't a grammar book; it's speaking regularly with someone who notices the slip, explains the why in two seconds, and lets you carry on talking.