How to say “hear” in 45 languages
Every one of these is a word that turns up in ordinary speech, not a dictionary curiosity — the number beside it is where it ranks in that language.
It is commonest in Basque, where entzun is the 63rd most used word.
- Afrikaans hoor To hear #136
- Albanian dëgjuar to hear #264
- Arabic أسمع to make hear, to let hear, to give someone… #369
- Armenian լսել to hear #230
- Basque entzun to hear, listen #63
- Bengali শোনো to hear, to listen to #364
- Bosnian čuo to hear #330
- Bulgarian чуя to hear #790
- Croatian čuo to hear #305
- Czech slyšet to hear #734
- Danish hør to hear #197
- Dutch hoor to hear #276
- Esperanto aŭdis to hear #266
- Estonian kuulma to hear #1,763
- Finnish kuulin to hear #443
- French entendu to hear #291
- Galician sinto to hear #463
- German gehört to hear through the ear #206
- Greek άκουσα to hear #550
- Hindi सुनो to listen, hear #261
- Hungarian hallottam to hear #284
- Icelandic heyra to hear #253
- Indonesian dengarkan to listen, to hear carefully #376
- Latvian dzirdēju to hear #496
- Lithuanian išgirsti to hear #689
- Macedonian слуша to listen, hear #912
- Malay dengar to hear; to listen #96
- Malayalam കേട്ടു to hear #231
- Norwegian hør to hear #212
- Persian شنیدم to hear #806
- Polish słyszałem to hear #542
- Portuguese ouvir to hear #335
- Romanian auzit to hear #190
- Russian услышать to hear #1,151
- Serbian čuo to hear #301
- Slovak počul to hear #248
- Slovenian slišati to hear #321
- Spanish oye to hear #205
- Swedish hör to hear #199
- Tagalog marinig to be able to hear #1,031
- Tamil கேள் to listen to, hear #201
- Telugu విన్నావు to hear #1,202
- Turkish dinle to listen, hear #235
- Ukrainian чути to hear #995
- Urdu سننا to listen, to hear #946
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.