How to say “yesterday” in 47 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.
- ayer/aˈʝeɾ/ Spanish
- вчера[ft͡ɕɪˈra] Russian
- أمس/ʔam.si/ Arabic
- 昨天/t͡su̯ɔ³⁵ tʰi̯ɛn⁵⁵/ Chinese
- कल/kəl/ Hindi
- χθες/xθes/ Greek
“yesterday” in Spanish: ayer · French: hier · German: gestern · Italian: ieri · Portuguese: ontem · Chinese: 昨天 · Russian: вчера · Arabic: أمس
It is commonest in Malayalam, where ഇന്നലെ is the 168th most used word.
Yesterday in other languages, A to Z
- Afrikaans gister/ˈχəs.tər/ yesterday; the previous day #464
- Albanian dje/djɛ/ #574
- Arabic أمس/ʔam.si/ #422
- Armenian երեկ/jeˈɾek/ #527
- Basque atzo/at͡s̻o/ #333
- Bengali গতকাল/ɡɔt̪okal/ #609
- Bosnian sinoć/sînoːt͡ɕ/ last night, yesterday night; yesterday evening #560
- Bulgarian вчера[ˈft͡ʃɛrɐ] #536
- Catalan ahir[əˈi] #471
- Chinese 昨天/t͡su̯ɔ³⁵ tʰi̯ɛn⁵⁵/ #237
- Croatian sinoć/sînoːt͡ɕ/ last night, yesterday night; yesterday evening #516
- Czech včera[ˈft͡ʃɛra] #432
- Dutch gisteren/ˈɣɪs.tə.rə(n)/ #609
- Esperanto hieraŭ/hiˈerau̯/ #486
- Estonian eile/ˈei̯le/ #399
- Finnish eilen/ˈei̯len/ #436
- French hier/jɛʁ/ #416
- Galician onte/ˈɔnte/ #432
- German gestern/ˈɡɛstərn/ #469
- Greek χθες/xθes/ #442
- Hebrew אתמול/(ʔ)etˈmol/ #319
- Hindi कल/kəl/ #222
- Hungarian tegnap[ˈtɛɡnɒp] #321
- Icelandic gær/caiːr/ #419
- Indonesian kemarin/kəˈmarin/ #569
- Italian ieri/ˈjɛ.ri/ #446
- Korean 거야[ˈkɘ(ː)ja̠] last night, yesterday evening #9
- Latvian vakar[vakar] #548
- Lithuanian vakar[²ˈʋɑːkɐr] #257
- Macedonian вчера[ˈft͡ʃɛɾa] #451
- Malay kelmarin/kəlˈmarin/ ereyesterday, the day before yesterday; two… #1,952
- Malayalam ഇന്നലെ/in̪n̪ɐle/ #168
- Persian دیروز[d̪iː.ɹúːz] #1,664
- Polish wczoraj/ˈft͡ʂɔ.raj/ #433
- Portuguese ontem/ˈõ.tẽj̃/ #407
- Romanian ieri/ˈjerʲ/ #621
- Russian вчера[ft͡ɕɪˈra] #426
- Serbian sinoć/sînoːt͡ɕ/ last night, yesterday night; yesterday evening #529
- Slovak včera/ft͡ʃera/ #285
- Slovenian včeraj/ʋt͡ʃèːraj/ #289
- Spanish ayer/aˈʝeɾ/ #663
- Swedish igår/ˈiːɡoːr/ #565
- Tagalog kahapon/kaˈhapon/ #1,238
- Tamil நேற்று/neːrːɯ/ #544
- Telugu నిన్న/ninːa/ #617
- Turkish dün/dyn/ #288
- Ukrainian вчора[ˈʍt͡ʃɔrɐ] #618
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.