27 August 2026

Fifty nouns for building your German vocabulary – part four

Learning German
4 min read
Updated: 28 August 2026
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Part four carries fifty further German nouns. For the table on this page we chose one particular family: the words of the town, the office and work. It is the family a newcomer stumbles over more than any other, because these are the words of the letters that arrive and the forms that have to be filled in.

Whoever masters these twenty-five can read an official letter and grasp what it is about before opening a translator — and that alone saves days of anxiety.

Why a store of words is built by volume, not by rule

Grammar organises what you already know; it does not produce what you do not. Someone who still cannot speak in the street after a year of study is usually short of words, not of rules. That is why this series comes in batches: fifty words at a time, heard, repeated and used, rather than analysed and explained. Anyone measuring their own progress knows that the distance between one level and the next is counted in words before it is counted in anything else.

Twenty-five nouns from the town, the office and work

Deutsch	English
die Stadt	the town
die Straße	the street
das Amt	the public office
der Antrag	the application
das Formular	the form
der Termin	the appointment
der Ausweis	the identity card
der Pass	the passport
die Anmeldung	the registration
die Wohnung	the flat
die Miete	the rent
das Konto	the bank account
die Bank	the bank
die Rechnung	the invoice
die Versicherung	the insurance
die Arbeit	the work
der Vertrag	the contract
der Lohn	the wage
die Schule	the school
die Ausbildung	the vocational training
der Brief	the letter
der Bescheid	the official decision
die Frist	the deadline
die Unterschrift	the signature
die Behörde	the authority

How to fix a word so it does not slip away

Listen to the part once through, then again while pronouncing along with it, not after it
Split the fifty over five days, ten a day — a single large batch is forgotten whole
Review yesterday's words before starting today's; two minutes are enough
Write one sentence per word taken from your own life, not from a book
Review the whole part after a week and again after a month — spacing is what moves a word into long-term memory
Anything forgotten twice goes on a small separate list and is reviewed on its own

Frequently asked questions

Which is the most important word in this table?
Two of them: der Bescheid and die Frist. The first means a decision has been issued about you; the second means you have a limited time to respond.

What is the difference between Antrag and Formular?
der Antrag is the application as a matter; das Formular is the sheet it is written on.

And between Amt and Behörde?
das Amt is the particular office; die Behörde is the authority in the wider sense.

Will these words help me in an exam?
In the exam and in your post alike — they are among the most frequent both in integration examinations and in official letters.

Watch the video

The video is on the OK+ channel on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ShGmJGTVPq8

Also on OK+

A tool that shortens the road

The OK Plus DE app gathers German administrative calculators and form templates in one place, free, ad-free, in seven languages. Android and iPhone, from the same page:
Get the OK Plus DE app

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