overwordExplorer
GERMAN · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

klein.

small, little, wee (in physical size or extent)

5 characters1 syllables approx.Deutsch language

Meaning & usage

adj/klaɪ̯n/
  1. small, little, wee (in physical size or extent)

  2. small, little, young (not grown up)

  3. insignificant (of little influence or means; of people)

    der kleine Mann
Where this word comes from

Inherited from Middle High German klein, kleine, from Old High German kleini, from Proto-West Germanic *klainī (“shining, fine, splendid, tender”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *gleh₁y- (“to cleave, stick”). Cognate with Dutch klein and English clean. Doublet of clean. For a similar semantic development, cf. zierlich (orig. "decorative", today "petite").

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klein studioklein workshello, klein

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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.