The American Guide to Learning German Pronouns

Want to learn the German pronouns but don’t know where to start? Check out this post for the American guide to learning German pronouns.

As an A1 German speaker, learning the German pronouns was harder than I thought it was going to be. At times, I would easily confuse Sie and sie which led to multiple mistakes in my translation. In fact, if you think about it on a broad scale, German has many different ways to say the word “you”.

So, if you’re new to the German language and you’re looking for an easy guide for all your pronoun problems, you’ve come to the right place. This post alone is an American guide to learning German pronouns so that you can be well-equipped to handle them in any kind of scenario.

German Subject Pronouns

German subject pronouns are pronouns used for whatever the subject is in the sentence. So, in other words, these pronouns take on the nominative case in German.

Subject Pronoun	English	Subject Pronoun	English
ich	I	wir	we
du	you	ihr	you (plural)
er/sie/es	he/she/it	Sie/sie	you (formal)/they

For example, if an American said “Jade is tired” in English, it would be translated as Jade ist muede in German.

“Jade” is the subject of the German sentence and it can be replaced by the subject pronoun Sie for “she”.

German Direct Object Pronouns

German direct object pronouns are pronouns used for whatever the direct object is in the sentence. So, in other words, these pronouns take on the accusative case in German.

Direct Object Pronoun	English	Direct Object Pronoun	English
mich	me	uns	us
dich	you	euch	you (plural)
ihn/sie/es	him/her/it	Sie/sie	you (formal)/them

For example, if an American said “I like Jeremy” in English, it would be translated as Ich mag Jeremy in German.

“Jeremy” is the direct object in the German sentence and it can be replaced by the direct object pronoun ihn for “him”.

German Indirect Object Pronouns

German indirect object pronouns are pronouns used for whatever the indirect object is in the sentence. So, in other words, these pronouns take on the dative case in German.

Indirect Object Pronoun	English	Indirect Object Pronoun	English
mir	to me	uns	to us
dir	to you	euch	to you (plural)
ihm/ihr/ihm	to him/to her/to it	Ihnen/ihnen	to you (formal)/to them

For example, if an American said “Give me the present” in English, it would be translated as Gib mir das Geschenk in German.

“Me” is the indirect object in the English sentence and it is represented by mir in German. In fact, it’s very common for a verb like “to give” to have an indirect object since it is a ditransitive verb.

Here are some other ditransitive verbs that use indirect objects:

Ditransitive Verbs	German Translations
to send	schicken
to ask	fragen
to tell	sagen
to buy	kaufen
to owe	schulden
to show	zeigen
to lend	leihen
to read	lesen
to make	machen

In addition, Germans also use indirect object pronouns after certain prepositions like mit (with) and nach (to).

For example:

Sie geht mit ihr ins Kino. (She goes to the movies with her.) 

German Reflexive Pronouns

German reflexive pronouns are pronouns used in order for a reflexive verb to make sense. For example, if you compare it to English, these German reflexive pronouns can be translated as “myself”, “herself” or “himself”. They are then used with reflexive verbs whose direct object is the same as its subject.

Reflexive Pronoun	English	Reflexive Pronoun	English
mich	myself	uns	ourselves
dich	yourself	euch	yourselves
sich	himself/herself/itself	sich	yourself (formal)/themselves

For example, if an American said “I wash myself” in English, it would translated as Ich wasche mich in German.

“Myself” is the reflexive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by mich in German.

German Possessive Pronouns (dependent)

Dependent possessive pronouns in German are used in situations where you want to signify possession. In fact, the reason why these pronouns in particular are dependent is because they always come before a noun.

Here are the following dependent possessive pronouns that are used for masculine and neuter nouns in the nominative case:

Possessive Pronoun	English	Possessive Pronoun	English
mein	my	unser	our
dein	your	euer	your (plural)
sein/sein/ihr	his/its/her	Ihr/ihr	your (formal)/their

Here are the following dependent possessive pronouns that are used for feminine and plural nouns in the nominative case:

Possessive Pronoun	English	Possessive Pronoun	English
meine	my	unsere	our
deine	your	eure	your (plural)
seine/seine/ihre	his/its/her	Ihre/ihre	your (formal)/their

So for example, if an American said “My father is nice” in English, it would translated as Mein Vater ist nett in German.

“My” is the possessive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by mein in German.

Accusative Case (german pronouns)

Here are the following possessive pronouns in the accusative case where the noun that is being possessed is the direct object:

Masculine	Neuter	Feminine/Plural	English
meinen	mein	meine	my
deinen	dein	deine	your
seinen	sein	seine	his, its
ihren/Ihren	ihr/Ihr	ihre/Ihre	her, their / your (formal)
unseren	unser	unsere	our
eueren	euer	eure	your (plural)

As an example, if an American said “I have your pencil” in English, it would be translated as Ich habe deinen Bleibstift in German.

“Your” is the possessive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by deinen in the accusative case.

Dative Case (german pronouns)

Here are the following possessive pronouns in the dative case where the noun that is being possessed is the indirect object:

Masculine/Neuter	Feminine	Plural	English
meinem	meiner	meinen	my
deinem	deiner	deinen	your
seinem	seiner	seinen	his, its
ihrem/Ihrem	ihrer/Ihrer	ihren/Ihren	her, their / your (formal)
unserem	unserer	unseren	our
euerem	eurer	euren	your (plural)

For example, if an American said “Give my sister the book” in English, it would be translated as Gib meiner Schwester das Buch in German.

“My” is the possessive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by meiner in the dative case.

German Possessive Pronouns (independent)

Independent possessive pronouns in German are also used in situations where you want to signify possession. However, these pronouns in particular are independent because they do not come before a noun. For example, if you were to compare these independent possessive pronouns to English, they would represent English words like “mine”, “ours” or “theirs”.

Here are the following independent possessive pronouns that are used for the nominative case:

Masculine	Neuter	Feminine/Plural	English
meiner	meins	meine	mine
deiner	deins	deine	yours
seiner	seins	seine	his
ihrer/Ihrer	ihres/Ihres	ihre/Ihre	hers, theirs / yours (formal)
unserer	unseres	unsere	ours
euerer	eures	eure	yours (plural)

So for example, if an American asked “Is that your pencil?”. They could respond with “Yes, that is mine.” in English. If this conversation was translated in German the question would be Ist das dein Bleibstift? and the response would be Das ist meiner.

“Mine” is the independent possessive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by meiner in German.

Accusative Case (german pronouns)

Here are the following independent possessive pronouns that are used for the accusative case:

Masculine	Neuter	Feminine/Plural	English
meinen	meins	meine	mine
deinen	deins	deine	yours
seinen	seins	seine	his
ihren/Ihren	ihres/Ihres	ihre/Ihre	hers, theirs / yours (formal)
unseren	unseres	unsere	ours
eueren	eures	eure	yours (plural)

So for example, if an American asked “Do you have my book?”. They could respond with “No, I have his.” in English. If this conversation was translated in German the question would be Hast du mein Buch? and the response would be Nein, ich habe seins.

“His” is the independent possessive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by seins in the accusative case.

Dative Case (german pronouns)

Here are the following independent possessive pronouns that are used for the dative case:

Masculine/Neuter	Feminine	Plural	English
meinem	meiner	meinen	mine
deinem	deiner	deinen	yours
seinem	seiner	seinen	his
ihrem/Ihrem	ihrer/Ihrer	ihren/Ihren	hers, theirs / yours (formal)
unserem	unserer	unseren	ours
euerem	eurer	euren	yours (plural)

So for example, if an American asked “Are you taking my car?”, they could respond with “No, I’d prefer mine.” in English. If this conversation was translated in German, the question would be Faehrst du mit meinem Auto? and the response would be Nein, lieber mit meinem.

“Mine” is the independent possessive pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by meinem in the dative case.

German Interrogative Pronouns

Interrogative pronouns in German are pronouns used to ask open-ended questions. They are of course not needed for yes or no questions since they require a specific response.

Interrogative Pronoun	English
wie	how
was	what
wo	where
woher	where (from)
wohin	where (to)
wann	when
warum	why
wer	who

For example, if an American said “What is that?” in English, it would be translated as Was ist das? in German.

“What” is the interrogative pronoun in the English sentence and it is represented by Was in German.

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Overall, I really hope you enjoyed reading this American guide to learning German pronouns for anyone who is new to this Germanic language. Please let me know in the comments down below what surprised you the most about it and if you have questions. I would love to hear from you! 🙂

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