by Erin McGann
Updated on January 9, 2024
The best Twitter accounts to follow if you’re learning German
If Facebook is full of memes and your relatives and Instagram is all about pretty photos, Twitter is the land of words. When you’re learning another language, Twitter can be a great place to read and experience your target language out in the wild. So here we are to recommend some of the best German language learning accounts out there!
When it comes to what’s officially correct in German, if it’s not in the Duden, it might as well not exist! Their account is a nice mix of esoteric German grammar, posts of word definitions from their dictionary, and answering questions from their followers.
The Deutsche Welle German learning resources are great, and the associated Twitter account doesn’t disappoint. Expect links to the slowly spoken German news, language quizzes and random pretty photos of Germany – just a nice little break from the scrolling.
For reasons I’m not entirely clear on, Jens Clasen, who is the editor of the German-language Women’s Health magazine, has become everyone’s favorite German language joke tweeter. He does great tweets explaining German words with more than one (often conflicting) meanings.
This is The Onion, only in German and older. The humor here can go over your head if you’re a German beginner, but it’s worth taking the time to puzzle it out. They also retweet actual news stories, so it’s a good exercise in figuring out context too.
One of Germany’s most famous news magazines, Der Spiegel is a good account to follow to learn relevant vocabulary connected to what’s going on in Germany and the rest of the world. Terms like ‘vaccinations’, ‘refugee’, and the names of government departments don’t come up in your average language lesson, so picking them up from German news Twitter is good practice.
This one is kind of just for fun, but this account really does just retweet people talking about long German words. Generally, it’s German-language learners exclaiming over their most recent discovery, but it’s quite fun to see them pop up in your timeline. Occasionally they post a long German word but with no explanation. So crack open your Duden and look it up!
If you love our literal English translations of German sayings, this account is for you. It’s an unending flow of words and phrases in German translated literally into English, followed by their actual meaning. Quatsch means, roughly, nonsense in English, by the way.
If you’ve been sitting on the train and the message coming over the intercom made everyone laugh but you didn’t catch it – this is the Twitter account for you. Witty comments from train, plane and ferry intercoms, all in German. There are many, many jokes about the DB Bordbistro/Bordrestaurant, so be prepared.
I don’t know how I missed out on the Grumpy Merkel Twitter account, but I’ve fixed it now. It’s very cheeky, but also very funny. It might take beginner German speakers a little time to translate, but it’s well worth the effort.
If you’re looking for that perfect Kartoffelsalat recipe, or how exactly to make Spätzle at home, Lecker magazine is a good first stop. Their Twitter feeds just links to their recipes online, but it’s a nice reminder to read through the articles and learn food and cooking vocabulary.
Nowadays the internet has given us a plethora of different approaches to languages and studying one does not entail old-fashioned and class-bound settings with one-way knowledge sharing. If one wants to genuinely learn, materials and resources are found all over, catering to different preferences. Twitter is one of the options available and these 10 channels are definitely not to be missed out!
