How to say “wrong” in 32 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 Tamil, where தவறு is the 144th most used word.
- Afrikaans makeer to be amiss, to be wrong #961
- Albanian faji misdeed, wrong; crime #555
- Arabic مخطئ wrong; mistaken #1,230
- Armenian թյուր false, wrong #1,817
- Bengali ভুল wrong, incorrect #149
- Bosnian pogrešan wrong, incorrect #2,191
- Catalan equivocat to mistake, be wrong about, make a mistake #991
- Croatian pogrešan wrong, incorrect #2,441
- Danish forkert wrongly, wrong, erroneously #525
- Dutch verkeerd #664
- Esperanto eraris to make a mistake, be wrong, err #1,406
- Finnish väärässä wrong, in the wrong, incorrect #793
- Greek φταίω to be to blame, be at fault, be in the wrong #1,350
- Italian sbagliato wrong, mistaken, erroneous, incorrect #671
- Latvian nepareizi wrong, incorrect, improper, wrongly,… #924
- Lithuanian bloga bad, wrong #535
- Macedonian погрешен wrong, incorrect, erroneous #1,353
- Malayalam തെറ്റ് wrong, error #249
- Norwegian feil #198
- Persian غلط #1,549
- Polish skrzywdzić to wrong, to harm #2,032
- Portuguese errado not correct; wrong; incorrect #524
- Romanian neregulă #1,300
- Serbian pogrešan wrong, incorrect #1,912
- Slovenian napačen incorrect, wrong #935
- Spanish equivocado mistaken, wrong #1,108
- Swedish fel wrong, wrongly, incorrectly, erroneously #151
- Tagalog mali #327
- Tamil தவறு #144
- Ukrainian зла evil, wrong #1,560
- Urdu غلط #228
- Vietnamese bậy morally wrong #2,064
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.