fehlen.
for there to be a lack [with dative ‘to someone/something’ and an (+ dative) ‘of something’] (idiomatically translated by English lack with the dative object as the subject)
Meaning & usage
for there to be a lack [with dative ‘to someone/something’ and an (+ dative) ‘of something’] (idiomatically translated by English lack with the dative object as the subject)
Der Suppe fehlt es an Geschmack.
to be absent, to be missing [with dative ‘to someone’] (idiomatically translated by English not have with the German subject as the direct object and the dative object as the subject)
Ich würde es kaufen, aber mir fehlt das Geld.
to be missed [with dative ‘by someone’] (idiomatically translated by English miss with the German subject as the direct object and the dative object as the subject)
Seit meinem Umzug fehlen mir meine Freunde.
to be felt
Fehlt dir etwas? - Nein, mir fehlt nichts, danke!
Was fehlt ihr denn?
to be absent, to be missing
Das Gemälde fehlt an der Wand.
to fail
to sin, to err
to miss
Where this word comes from
From Middle High German vælen, velen, valen, from Old French falir, faillir, from Latin fallō. Cognate with English fail.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.