Free English to German translator with the register set first — du or Sie — and names kept exactly as you wrote them.
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English to German translator
English to German translation with the register set first
Paste English and get German back with the register already decided: du for people you know, Sie for everyone else. Most translators make that choice for you and do not mention it. This one asks first, because in German it changes the grammar of every sentence, and a translation that gets it wrong is fluent and still wrong.
How to translate English to German
Three steps. The second is the one most translators skip.
1
Paste or upload the English
Type, paste or drop in a document. English is already selected as the source on this page; if the text turns out to be something else, the detector says so above the editor and you can change it.
2
Set the register and mark the names to keep
Pick Sie or du from the register selector beside the language names, or leave it on Match source tone to follow the English. Select any name, brand or product term in the text and press Keep so it is not translated.
3
Translate, then check it
Read the German if you can. If you cannot, back-translate it: run the result through German to English and compare the meaning, sentence by sentence, with what you started from.
What changes between English and German
The differences that decide whether a translation reads as written by a person.
Script and directionEnglish is written in Latin; German in Latin.
Word orderEnglish is subject-verb-object; German is verb-second in main clauses, verb-final in subordinate clauses. Sentences are rebuilt, not mapped word for word, and long sentences are where a weak translator loses the thread.
How politeness is markedGerman separates 'du' (familiar, singular), 'ihr' (familiar, plural) and 'Sie' (polite, always capitalised, singular and plural). Business and official writing uses 'Sie' unless someone has offered 'du'.
Formality in EnglishEnglish has no separate polite and familiar 'you'. Register lives in vocabulary and sentence shape instead: 'Could you let me know' against 'Tell me', 'purchase' against 'buy'.
Where translation into German goes wrong
Three things German readers notice at once, and a machine has to be told about.
Capitalised nouns
All nouns are capitalised, which changes how a sentence looks; 'sie' (she, they) and 'Sie' (you, polite) differ only by that capital.
Four cases
Four cases change article and adjective endings ('der', 'den', 'dem', 'des'); a wrong case is immediately visible to a German reader.
Compound nouns
German builds long compound nouns ('Kundendatenschutzrichtlinie') where English uses a phrase; a translator has to decide when to join words.
What has to be read correctly in the English first
Errors that start on the source side, before a single German word is chosen.
'You' is ambiguous
'You' is ambiguous: one person or several, a friend or a stranger. Translators guess, and a guess in the wrong direction is the single most common way an English original lands badly.
Stacked nouns
English piles up nouns ('customer data retention policy'); most languages need those unpacked into phrases, and a literal rendering is unreadable.
Phrasal verbs and idioms
Phrasal verbs ('put up with', 'look into') and idioms are translated word by word by weaker systems.
Who translates English to German here
1
Emails to German, Austrian and Swiss companies and authorities.
2
German coursework and Goethe-Institut exam practice.
3
Reading German contracts, product manuals and news.
Yes. Translate English to German without an account, within the per-run word allowance shown beside the editor. Signing in raises it, and Pro removes the guest limits and the ads. The pricing page lists what each plan includes.
Should I translate into German as Sie or du?
German separates 'du' (familiar, singular), 'ihr' (familiar, plural) and 'Sie' (polite, always capitalised, singular and plural). Business and official writing uses 'Sie' unless someone has offered 'du'. Use du for friends, family and people who have used it with you; use Sie for customers, officials, employers and anyone you have not met. The register selector sets this before the translation is made, so the grammar comes out right the first time rather than being patched afterwards.
Will it translate names, brands and product terms?
Not unless you want it to. Select a name or a term in the editor and press Keep, and it is passed through exactly as written. This matters for English to German because a brand name can look like an ordinary word and get 'translated' into one.
How accurate is machine translation from English to German?
Good enough to understand a document, answer an email or draft a reply, and it improves when you set the register and mark the names as kept first. It is not a substitute for a human translator on a contract, a medical document or anything with legal weight. The reliable way to check a translation you cannot read is to back-translate it: paste the German result into a new run set to English and see whether the meaning survived.
Can I translate a whole document from English to German?
Yes. Drop in a .docx, .pdf or .txt file, or paste the text; the output keeps the paragraph structure and can be copied, edited in place or exported.
Can I translate German to English as well?
Yes. Use the German to English translator, or press the swap button between the two language names on this page. Either way the register and the kept terms come with you.
After the translation
Check the English before you translate it, or shift the register of the result once it is in German. One plan covers every tool.
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