zögern
German, verb
zögern is spelled Z-Ö-G-E-R-N (6 letters) and appears 6.0 times per million words in written German, the 10,637th most frequent German word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Zögern is a German verb meaning “to hesitate, to pause before doing something” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). With a capital, Zögern is a different word: “gerund of zögern”. The German Wiktionary defines it as “etwas aufschieben, nicht sofort tun”.
What does zögern mean in English?
verb
- 1
to hesitate, to pause before doing something
noun
- 1
neutergerund of zögern
Source: English Wiktionary, German section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How German dictionaries define it
verb: 1. etwas aufschieben, nicht sofort tun
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 zögern
- zögert present singular third-person
- zögerte past
- gezögert participle past
- haben auxiliary
- zögernd participle present
- zögre first-person indicative present
- zögere first-person indicative present
- zöger first-person indicative present
- zögerst indicative present second-person
- zögerest second-person singular subjunctive
- zögrest second-person singular subjunctive
- zögeret plural second-person subjunctive
- zögret plural second-person subjunctive
- zögerten first-person indicative plural
- zögertest indicative preterite second-person
- zögertet indicative plural preterite
- zögere! imperative singular
- zögert! imperative plural
Source: English Wiktionary and German Wiktionary (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
English words that translate to zögern
Source: the translation tables of the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026.
How common is zögern in German?
zögern appears 6.0 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).