The meaning of "zwischen" | Your Daily German (2023)

Hello everyone,

and welcome to our German Word of the Day. Andthis time, we will have a look at the meaning of

zwischen

Zwischenlooks like the lovechild of wischen (to wipe) and zischen (to hiss)butit’s not. It is a preposition and it meansbetween. The origin of both those words is the same … an old version of the word for 2… the German version is just… well, shhhh-er :). But we can do even shhhh-erer… just take the German imitation of birds noises…zwitschern. Imagine a German had invented Twitter… it would be calledZwitscher …”Hey follow me on Zwitscher“…
“What? Where???“
“Zwitscher.. that’s German.. it is like ‘tsvittshair'”
“Oh… uh I.. I’ll check it out .” … I doubt it would have been as successful. But back to our Word of the Day Zierfisch… uh I mean zwischen.
So zwischen means between and that works pretty much one to one…

• Ich komme wohl so zwischen 6 und 7.
• I’ll probably come somewhere between 6 and 7.

• Zwischen dem Herd und dem Kühlschrank sollte ein bisschen Platz sein.
• There is a hole between the stove and the fridge.

• Zwischen Thomas und Maria stimmt die Chemie.
• Between Thomas and Maria there is good chemistry.

So far so good. What makes zwischeninteresting are the many words that are build with it. The most obvious one is certainly dazwischen. If you already have an idea of the da-words(check those out here) you probably know that it meansbetween that. Since you usually need more items than one if you want to put stuff in between dazwischen also means between those or in between…

• Thomas hatte gestern insgesamt 75 Meetings. Aber dazwischen hatte er immer ein bisschen Pause, es war also ok.
• Thomas had 75 meetings yesterday. But he had short breaks in between so it was okay.

• Hier sind alle meine Superboy Comics. Der Playboy ist irgendwo dazwischen.
• Here are all my Superboy comics. The Playboy is somewhere between them/among them.

• “Auf einer Skala von 1 bis 10… wie fandest du den Film?”
  “Hmmm… schwierig… nicht 10 aber auch nicht 8… irgendwas dazwischen.”
• “On a scale from 1 to 10… how did you like the movie?”
  “Hmmm… hard to say… not a 10 but not an 8 either… something in between.”

The next word is inzwischen and it looks like a direct translation of in between. However, it is not. Inzwischenis actually a time word… not super common but certainly one of the words that can really enrich your vocabulary. One translation isin the meantime or meanwhile.

• Schneid’ du mal das Gemüse und ich mache inzwischen schon mal das Dessert.
• You go ahead cut the vegetables and I’ll prepare the dessert (so we got that done).

However, German has other words to express the “parallel-ness” of events in time… derweil and währenddessen and those are the better choice for random things. Inzwischensounds right in personal situations like the one in the example. But it has a second meaning and that is the more common one I would say. It is something like by now or since then.

• Vor 2 Jahren dachte ich noch, Deutsch ist superschwer aberinzwischen habe ich meine Meinung geändert.
• 2 years ago, I thought German was super difficult, but I have changed my mind since/ I have changed my opinion.

• Früher musste man 2 Stunden warten bis der neue Trailer runtergeladen war. Inzwischen kann man HD im Stream gucken.
• In the 90s, you would have to wait for 2 hours until the download of the new trailer was completed. Today/Nowadays/By nowyou can watch HD in streaming.

So… it is still kind of in the meantime but in the meantime related to now and with a strong focus not on what happens but on the result… like… things happened in the meantime and soinzwischen(now) it is this or that way. It isn’t even really important what time span exactly… in the following example it is probably from the last meeting till now…

• Und.. warst du inzwischen mal in der Ausstellung, die ich dir empfohlen habe?
• So… have you been to that exhibition I recommended by now?

And here, we have no idea at all…

• Mein Gott… Eintritt zu Parties ist inziwschen so teuer geworden. Ich kann mir das fast nicht mehr leisten.
• My God… the cover has become sooo expansive. I can barely afford it.

So.. sometimes inzwischen doesn’t really translate to a word but rather just transports the idea of change that has happened. That makes it quite handy in certain situations.

• Maria hat 2 Jahre in der inzwischen geschlossenenBar am Kirchplatz gearbeitet.
• Maria worked for 2 years in that bar at Kirchplatzthat has since closed.

With inzwischen and a participle construction it is no problem to squeeze all that in front of the noun with the result that the German sentence is almost as short as the English one… what a success :).
All right.
The next word is also quite useful and it is also quite likely that you will see it if you spend time in Germany because marketing people love it… zwischendurch. What? Can a word that looks like your cat has walked across the keyboard really have any appeal? Like…

• Ok… I need a claim… “Crunsh-crispies – Der Top Snack für zwisChenDur… hey damn cat… get off my computer…

But it does. You can find billion of ideas for Snacks für zwischendurch on Google( here...). So what is it with zwischendurch? Well, it is a word especially great for our multitasking society… zwischendurch means in between times or on the side. If you eat something zwischendurch, then it is not really a meal… it is the apple that makes you fat or the candy bar that keeps the doctor aw… hold on, something is wrong… meh anyway… if you do something zwischendurch you do it basically while you are actually doing something else or you make a quick break doing something else. Examples:

• Wenn ich schreibe, dann bin ich super fokussiert. Ich gucke nur zwischendurch mal meine Mails nach.
• When I write I am super focused. I just check my mailsevery now and then (“in short pauses”)
  

• “Wie war der Film?”
  “Ach ganz gut… ich hab’ zwischendurch mal kurz geschlafen aber insgesamt war’s cool.”
• “How was the movie?”
  “Oh, it was alright… I slept for a few minutes at some pointbut all in all it was cool.”

• Die neue CD ist ziemlich gut. Das einzige Problem ist, dass da zwischendurch immer so komische Gedichte vorgelesen werden.
• The new CD is pretty good. The only problem is that there are all those odd poems being read in between things.
  

I hope that gives you an idea of zwischendurch. Now… there are 2 things I want to mention, firstly zwischendurch and inzwischenare NOT synonyms. Inzwischen focuses on a change of sorts and it is usually used to compare past to present. Zwischendurch on the other hand is more a description of how or when you do something… like “in between times” or on the side. I don’t really find a better way to put it so if I am not clear just ask me in a comment and I’ll try to explain it better. Anyway… the second thing we need to be clear about is that inzwischen,zwischendurch and dazwischen all have the same function in a sentence while the functionof just zwischen is completely different. Zwischen is always completed by a thing or a person. The other words NEVER are… you cannot say

• zwischendurch mein Arbeit
• dazwischen dem Tisch

Zwischendurch and the others are full answers to the question when?or where? for dazwischen.

Okay… now let’s look at zwischen as a prefix. Okay… not really a prefix… more a part of a compound word. There is fair number of nouns that start with zwischen and it can add the idea of in between… a Zwischenruf is a shout in between… for instance during an opera (don’t do it) or a Zwischenraumis a very generic word for gap… it is space in between things. On a more abstract level zwischen can also add the idea of intermediate or not final... like… der Zwischenstop is not the final stop, das Zwischenergebnis is a result but not the final result, Zwischenmiete is a rental period but not a serious one and the … just a short term and so on.
Now… does this also work for verbs? Well, kind of … but the verb for Zwischenruf would actually be dazwiscHenruFe… hey, hey will you get off here you damn feline or kiss your “tun(a)ight” good bye… … … … … … did I just do that pun?
Oh man, this is so bad… I think I have to stop for today… so… this was our Word of the Day zwischen. It is a really deformed version of zwei and it means between. Also it is part of quite a few nouns and the base for 2 quite handy time words… inzwischen and zwischendurch.And to give you one last example…

• Bis vor einem Jahr habe ich viel zwischen den Mahlzeiten gegessen aber inzwischen esse ich nichts mehr zwischendurch.
• Until a year ago, I used to eat a lot betweenmeals but by nowI have stopped eating between meals / between times.

If you have any questions or suggestions just leave me a comment. I hope you liked it and see you next time.