Rule for neuter · das

Nominalized infinitives

Any infinitive used as a noun is das · 100%.

The rule, in plain language

In German you can turn almost any verb in its infinitive form into a noun just by capitalizing it - and the result is always neuter, with no exceptions. That's how you get words like das Leben (life, from “leben” - to live), das Rennen (the race/running, from “rennen” - to run), and das Unternehmen (the company/enterprise, from “unternehmen” - to undertake). It's one of the few 100%-reliable gender rules in German: once you recognize a capitalized infinitive acting as a noun, you can bet on das without a second thought. In our frequent-word set it covers 1.2% of all nouns (28 words) and has no known exceptions.

In the A1-B1 vocabulary of the Genau course, this rule covers 28 words (1.2%) and has no exceptions.

Representative examples

All course words that follow this rule

Rules stick through practice. In the Genau app you train exactly this rule on its own words, with the GENAU! stamp on every correct answer - free, offline, no account. Coming soon to the App Store.