Learning Swedish: Navigating the Easy Paths and Trickier Trails

Is Swedish hard to learn? Or, if we were to ask that question in Swedish: Är svenska svårt att lära sig? (click on that sentence to hear an audio recording of its pronunciation)

This article explores both the simpler aspects that make Swedish accessible for English speakers and some of the common hurdles learners encounter.

The Easier Side: What Makes Swedish Approachable?

The Swedish Alphabet is (Mostly) Simple

Swedish, as you can tell by the example sentence Är svenska svårt att lära sig? uses the Latin alphabet just like English does, but with a few additional letters: å, ä, and ö.

Learning Swedish is made simpler by not having to memorize an entirely new script in the way that languages like Korean, Hebrew, or Greek require. However, while the letters themselves are familiar additions, mastering their distinct sounds, especially 'å', 'ä', and 'ö', presents an initial phonetic hurdle we'll discuss later.

But Hungarian and Finnish, which are two notoriously difficult languages to learn, also use the Latin alphabet, so there is more to the difficulty of learning a language than just its alphabet.

Swedish and English are Related Languages

Linguists study how languages evolved and group them into families of related languages, just as biologists classify plants and animals. The difficulty of learning a foreign language is, unsurprisingly, often proportional to the differences between that foreign language and one's native language.

Swedish and English are both in the family of Indo-European languages (Hungarian and Finnish, by the way, are not). Swedish and English are also on the same branch within that family because they are both Germanic languages.

This close linguistic relationship suggests that Swedish is an easier-to-learn language for English speakers. Indeed, most Germanic languages are relatively easy for English speakers to learn, with a few exceptions like Icelandic, a Germanic language that has remained close to the ancient Old Norse language of the Viking era.

Swedish Grammar: Simpler in Some Respects...

So what makes Swedish generally easier and Icelandic more difficult from a grammatical standpoint? Grammatical cases are a big part of the reason. They are changes in the endings of words that reflect their grammatical function in a sentence.

In the early Middle Ages, Old English had grammatical cases. But just as they have mostly disappeared from Modern English (except for pronouns), they have also mostly vanished from Swedish, while Icelandic has kept them.

This significantly reduces the amount of inflectional endings to memorize compared to many other languages.

Swedish Vocabulary is Often Familiar

Vocabulary is another factor to consider in answering the question: "Is Swedish an easy language?"

Consider the Swedish version of that question, Är svenska ett lätt språk? and notice how the Swedish word "språk" differs from its English equivalent ("language") but resembles the English word "speech," which comes from the same root.

Many Swedish words, like vinter (winter) or sommar (summer), are instantly recognizable. In linguistics, words from different languages that share a common origin are called cognates.

Språk and "speech" are not the only Swedish-English cognates. There are plenty more, and they contribute to making Swedish easier for English speakers to learn.

Even if you have never studied Swedish, you can likely recognize or guess the meaning of many common Swedish words thanks to these cognates. Some Swedish-English cognates have Germanic roots.

Others have Latin roots because both languages have absorbed Latin-derived terms. In addition, Swedish has borrowed some words directly from English —while Icelandic avoids foreign loan words.

Examples of similar vocabulary words in Swedish and English:

Swedish Verbs are Notably Simple

Another thing that makes Swedish easy to learn is the conjugation of verbs —or rather the fact that Swedish verbs are generally not conjugated according to the subject pronoun in the present tense.

For example, here are the conjugation tables for the verb "to be" in English and Swedish. Notice how in Swedish, the same verb form is used for all subject pronouns in the present tense.

Similarly, for the verb "to speak" (tala):

The Harder Aspects: Common Challenges for English Speakers

While these aspects contribute to Swedish being accessible, no language learning journey is without its challenges. Let's explore some of the trickier aspects English speakers encounter.

Pronunciation: The Sound Barrier

This is often cited as one of the primary challenges.

(🎧 click on any of the Swedish phrases in this section to hear an audio recording of their pronunciation)

Vowels

Swedish boasts nine distinct vowel sounds, many of which lack direct English equivalents, particularly the rounded front vowels. Distinguishing and producing these can take considerable practice.

The sj-sound and tj-sound

The infamous sj-sound (and its various spellings like sk before front vowels, stj, skj) can be notoriously difficult for English speakers to master, as it has no direct counterpart. The tj-sound also presents a unique challenge.

Pitch Accent

Swedish is a pitch-accent language. This means the "melody" or tone used on a word can differentiate its meaning. While not always crucial for basic comprehension, mastering pitch accent is key to sounding more natural.

Another example:

Grammatical Nuances Beyond Verbs

While verbs are simple in the present tense, other areas of grammar require attention:

Noun Genders and Declensions

Swedish nouns have two genders – en (common) and ett (neuter) – which affect the articles and how adjectives are declined. For instance, "a big book" is en stor bok, but "a big house" is ett stort hus.

Learners must also master the four definite forms of nouns (indefinite singular, definite singular, indefinite plural, definite plural), e.g., for "book": en bok (a book), boken (the book), böcker (books), böckerna (the books).

Word Order (V2 Rule)

In main clauses, Swedish typically follows the V2 (verb-second) rule, meaning the finite verb is the second constituent of the sentence. For instance, in a standard sentence: Jag läser en bok. (I am reading a book.)

If an adverbial or object starts the sentence, the subject must move after the verb: Idag läser jag en bok. (Literally: "Today read I a book," meaning "Today I am reading a book.")

Another example: Boken läste jag igår. (The book read I yesterday.)

"False Friends" and Idioms

Like any language pair, there are "false friends" – words that look or sound similar but have different meanings (e.g., eventuellt means "possibly" or "potentially," as in Jag kommer eventuellt imorgon. - I will possibly come tomorrow; it does not mean "eventually").

Understanding and using idiomatic expressions, such as att lägga benen på ryggen (literally "to put one's legs on one's back," meaning "to run away quickly"), also takes time and exposure.

The Overall Picture: Still One of the Easiest for English Speakers

Despite these harder aspects, the U.S. Foreign Service Institute (FSI), which teaches foreign languages to diplomats, offers a useful perspective. Based on their teaching experience, they rate languages into four categories based on their learning difficulty (for English speakers):

They classify Swedish in the easiest category. The FSI estimates that reaching "general professional proficiency" in Swedish requires 24 weeks of full-time study.

The same study duration applies to Norwegian, Danish, Dutch, and Italian, while Spanish and French take slightly longer, at 30 weeks each.

It's important to note that these FSI estimates assume intensive, full-time study under optimal conditions, which may differ from an individual learner's experience.

References:

[1] U.S. Foreign Service Institute language difficulty ratings