What does 'hoor' mean in Dutch?
Kleine praatjes op kantoor in het Nederlands
A2 Dutch listening practice · Dutch · Curated for beginners
Hoor is Dutch’s friendliest little word. Tacked onto the end of a short sentence, it softens, reassures, or signals 'don’t worry about it.' Ja, hoor (yeah, sure), nee, hoor (oh, no need), graag, hoor (gladly, really). It’s untranslatable into English in one word, and English speakers learning Dutch often skip it; native speakers spot the gap immediately.
This office-small-talk clip is hoor-heavy: « Nee, hoor. Zwart is prima » (no need, black coffee’s fine), « Ja, hoor » (sure, will do), « Ja, gezellig » with the same warmth. Hoor turns clipped coworker exchanges into something companionable. Drop it from the same dialogue and the speakers sound terse.
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Quick glosses for vocabulary that goes beyond this video’s A2 level.
Source: wordfreq 3.1.1 (general) · SUBTLEX-NL 2014 (spoken). Buckets approximate; exact ranks not stored.
- ▸In Dutch sitcoms and reality TV like Heel Holland Bakt on NPO and Wie is de Mol? on AVROTROS where contestants reassure each other with hoor
- ▸On Dutch radio breakfast shows on NPO Radio 1 and Radio 538 where hosts soften corrections and good-natured jabs with hoor
- ▸In Dutch parenting and family content on Linda and Ouders van Nu where parents reach for hoor to comfort children
- ▸In Dutch language-learning content like Bart de Pau on YouTube and the DutchPod101 lessons when teachers walk through Dutch fillers