scheitern
German, verb
scheitern is spelled S-C-H-E-I-T-E-R-N (9 letters) and appears 19 times per million words in written German, the 4,201st most frequent German word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Scheitern is a German verb meaning “to fail, to conclude unsuccessfully” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). With a capital, Scheitern is a different word: “collapse, breakup”. The German Wiktionary defines it as “etwas nicht erreichen, das man erreichen will”.
What does scheitern mean in English?
verb
- 1
to fail, to conclude unsuccessfully
Warum ist das Projekt gescheitert?
- 2
to flounder
noun
- 1
neutergerund of scheitern
- 2
neutercollapse, breakup
- 3
neuterfailure
Source: English Wiktionary, German section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How German dictionaries define it
verb: 1. etwas nicht erreichen, das man erreichen will
noun: 1. das Fehlschlagen eines Vorhabens
The definition in the German Wiktionary, in German.
Source: German Wiktionary, dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of scheitern
- scheitert present singular third-person
- scheiterte past
- gescheitert participle past
- sein auxiliary
- scheiternd participle present
- scheitre first-person indicative present
- scheitere first-person indicative present
- scheiter first-person indicative present
- scheiterst indicative present second-person
- scheiterest second-person singular subjunctive
- scheitrest second-person singular subjunctive
- scheiteret plural second-person subjunctive
- scheitret plural second-person subjunctive
- scheiterten first-person indicative plural
- scheitertest indicative preterite second-person
- scheitertet indicative plural preterite
- scheitere! imperative singular
- scheitert! imperative plural
Source: English Wiktionary and German Wiktionary (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
English words that translate to scheitern
Source: the translation tables of the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026.
How common is scheitern in German?
scheitern appears 19 times per million words in written German.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).