How to say “life” in 50 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 Chinese, where 生活 is the 55th most used word.
- Afrikaans lewe #102
- Albanian jetën #204
- Arabic حياتي Of life; living #177
- Armenian կյանք #532
- Basque bizitza #131
- Bengali জীবন #167
- Bosnian život #185
- Bulgarian живот #205
- Catalan vida #121
- Chinese 生活 #55
- Croatian život #171
- Czech život #179
- Danish liv #165
- Dutch levens #1,392
- English death The cessation of life and all associated… #379
- Esperanto vivo #133
- Estonian elu #149
- Finnish elämäni life day-to-day existence #738
- French vie life, the state of organisms prior to death #128
- Galician vida #89
- Georgian ცხოვრება #178
- Greek ζωή #128
- Hindi जीवन life, existence, subsistence #156
- Hungarian életben #497
- Icelandic líf #228
- Indonesian hidup to be alive; to have life #114
- Italian vita #135
- Korean 평생 one's entire life, lifetime #330
- Latvian dzīve #384
- Lithuanian amžius #974
- Macedonian живот #146
- Malay hidup #105
- Malayalam ജീവിതം life; living #106
- Norwegian livet #179
- Persian جان soul; life; life-force #269
- Polish życia #276
- Portuguese viver to live; to have life #428
- Romanian viața #1,376
- Russian жизнь #157
- Serbian život #173
- Slovak život #132
- Slovenian življenje #114
- Spanish vida #122
- Swedish liv #155
- Tagalog buhay #71
- Tamil வாழ to live, sustain life #188
- Turkish hayatım #426
- Ukrainian життя #124
- Urdu زندگی #134
- Vietnamese kiếp a life; an incarnation #644
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.