steppen
German, verb
steppen is spelled S-T-E-P-P-E-N (7 letters) and appears about once in every 1 million words in written German, the 39,859th most frequent German word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Steppen is a German verb meaning “to sew a straight seam with narrow stitches” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). With a capital, Steppen is a different word: “plural of Steppe”. The German Wiktionary defines it as “etwas dicht vernähen”.
What does steppen mean in English?
verb
- 1
to sew a straight seam with narrow stitches
- 2
to quilt
verb
- 1
to step-dance, (especially) to tap-dance
noun
- 1
plural of Steppe
noun
- 1
neutergerund of steppen
Source: English Wiktionary, German section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How German dictionaries define it
verb: 1. etwas dicht vernähen
verb: 1. einen Stepp tanzen; mit beschlagenen Schuhen so tanzen, dass der Rhythmus deutlich hörbar wird
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 steppen
- steppt present singular third-person
- steppte past
- gesteppt participle past
- haben auxiliary
- steppend participle present
- steppe first-person indicative present
- steppst indicative present second-person
- steppest second-person singular subjunctive
- steppet plural second-person subjunctive
- steppten first-person indicative plural
- stepptest indicative preterite second-person
- stepptet indicative plural preterite
- stepp imperative second-person singular
- habe gesteppt first-person indicative multiword-construction
- haben gesteppt first-person indicative multiword-construction
- steppe! imperative singular
- steppt! imperative plural
- gesteppt haben active infinitive perfect
Source: English Wiktionary and German Wiktionary (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
How common is steppen in German?
steppen appears about once in every 1 million words in written German.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).