How to say “thing” in 50 different 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.
- cosas/ˈkosas/ Spanish
- شيء/ʃajʔ/ Arabic
- 것[kʌ̹t̚] Korean
- चीज़/t͡ʃiːz/ Hindi
- πράγματα/ˈpraɣmaˌta/ Greek
- իր/iɾ/ Armenian
“thing” in Spanish: cosas · French: chose · German: dinge · Italian: cose · Portuguese: coisa · Korean: 것 · Arabic: شيء · Hindi: चीज़
It is commonest in Turkish, where şey is the 17th most used word.
Thing in other languages, A to Z
- Afrikaans dinge/ˈdəŋə/ #235
- Albanian gjë/ɟə/ #65
- Arabic شيء/ʃajʔ/ #28
- Armenian իր/iɾ/ #30
- Bengali জিনিস/d͡ʒiniʃ/ #174
- Bosnian stvar/stʋâːr/ #171
- Bulgarian онзи[ˈɔnzi] Used in indicating a person or thing that is… #425
- Catalan coses[ˈkɔ.zəs] #135
- Chinese 好事/xɑʊ̯²¹⁴⁻²¹ ʂɻ̩⁵¹/ good thing #495
- Croatian stvar/stʋâːr/ #169
- Czech věci[ˈvjɛt͡sɪ] #197
- Danish ting/tenˀɡ/ #151
- Dutch die/di/ that; referring to a thing or a person… #23
- English something[ˈsʌm(p)θɪŋ] An uncertain or unspecified thing; one thing #107
- Esperanto afero/aˈfero/ #231
- Estonian asi/ˈɑsi/ a thing #110
- French chose/ʃoz/ #91
- Galician cousas/ˈkowsas/ #118
- Georgian რამ[ɾäm] something, thing #2
- German dinge/ˈdɪŋə/ #385
- Greek πράγματα/ˈpraɣmaˌta/ thing, entity, object #159
- Hebrew חיבור/χibbuʁ/ a thing connecting things, a joining in a… #2,185
- Hindi चीज़/t͡ʃiːz/ thing, object, item #1,068
- Hungarian dolog[ˈdoloɡ] thing, object #183
- Icelandic tilefni/ˈtʰɪːlɛpnɪ/ reason for doing a thing #1,705
- Indonesian sesuatu/səsuˈatu/ something; a thing uncertain, undetected, or… #72
- Italian cose/ˈkɔ.ze/ thing, matter #136
- Korean 것[kʌ̹t̚] thing; something; that which; what; used to… #27
- Latvian lietas/ˈlietas/ #200
- Lithuanian dalykas[dɐ²ˈlʲiːkɐs] thing, object #315
- Macedonian нешта[ˈnɛʃta] #519
- Malay benda/bənˈda/ object, thing, stuff, item, good #219
- Malayalam ഉള്ളത്/uɭɭɐd̪ɨ/ that which is present; the available thing #191
- Norwegian ting/ˈtɪŋ/ a thing #158
- Persian چیز[t͡ʃʰiːz] #277
- Polish rzeczy/ˈʐɛ.t͡ʂɘ/ #161
- Portuguese coisa/ˈkoj.zɐ/ #68
- Romanian lucru[ˈlukru] thing; object #140
- Russian такое[tɐˈkojə] something like that, something like this,… #167
- Serbian stvar/stʋâːr/ #179
- Slovak vec/vet͡s/ #152
- Slovenian stvar/stʋáːr/ #162
- Spanish cosas/ˈkosas/ #124
- Swedish saker/ˈsɑːkɛr/ a thing #203
- Tagalog bagay/ˈbaɡaj/ thing; object; item #151
- Tamil நல்லது/nɐllɐd̪ɯ/ good, good thing, that which is good #93
- Telugu వస్తువు/ˈʋastuʋu/ a thing, article, matter, substance #475
- Turkish şey/ˈʃej/ #17
- Ukrainian речі[ˈrɛt͡ʃʲi] thing, object #288
- Urdu چیز/t͡ʃiːz/ #146
The speaker reads the word in the voice the LangX app uses for that language — synthesised, not a recording of a native speaker, so treat it as a guide. A row without a button has no reading we are free to use, or none we trust, yet. Voices for Bengali (google (bn_BD), CC BY-SA 4.0), Catalan (upc_ona (ca_ES), CC BY-SA 4.0), Estonian (news (et_EE), CC BY 4.0) and Slovenian (artur (sl_SI), CC BY 4.0).
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.