Sorry in German: Entschuldigung and Es Tut Mir Leid (With Audio)

German › Phrases › Sorry in German

Updated August 2026 · Everyday German · 8-minute read · 🔊 every name has native audio

Two words, and they are not interchangeable

German splits what English packs into one word.

Entschuldigung asks to be excused. You are getting past somebody, interrupting, or catching a waiter’s eye. It is small, frequent and socially light.

Es tut mir leid expresses regret. Literally “it does me sorrow” — and Germans mean it that way. This is the one for something that actually mattered.

Using the heavy one for a light thing sounds odd, and the light one for a heavy thing sounds dismissive. That is the whole distinction, and it is worth two minutes.

Every way to apologise, spoken

Why Entschuldigung is the most useful word on this page

It is not really an apology at all. Broken apart it is Ent- (un-) + Schuld (guilt/debt) + -igung — a de-guilting. You are asking to be released from a small obligation.

Which is why it stretches so far. It gets you through a crowd. It gets a waiter’s attention. It opens a question to a stranger on the street. In a German train station you will hear it forty times an hour, and almost none of those people are apologising.

Saying these out loud

sch is always sh. Entschuldigung is ent-SHOOL-di-goong, schon gut is shohn goot.

ei is eye. Leid rhymes with “light”. The reverse pair ie is a long ee. Order of the two letters is the whole rule.

V is an f and z is a ts. Verzeihung is fehr-TSY-oong — both rules in one word.

Final b, d and g harden. Halb so wild is hahlp zoh vilt: the b becomes p, the d becomes t.

Three situations, three different words

You need to get past someone on a train. Entschuldigung. That is it. Not an apology — a request to be let through, and it is what every German says forty times a day.

You are ten minutes late to a meeting. Entschuldigung für die Verspätung — sorry for the delay. Germans treat lateness as a real discourtesy, so say it as you sit down rather than letting it pass unmentioned.

You have genuinely let someone down. Es tut mir wirklich leid. This is where Entschuldigung would sound flippant. The heavier phrase exists for exactly this, and Germans notice which one you reach for.

The register ladder

German apologies sit on a clear scale, and knowing where each one lands stops you sounding either casual or theatrical.

Sorry — borrowed, spoken only, under about forty. Fine between friends, wrong in an email to a stranger.

Entschuldigung — the neutral default. Works everywhere, with everyone, in speech and in writing.

Es tut mir leid — genuine regret. Heavier, and reserved.

Verzeihung — formal, a little old-fashioned, still alive. Common from older speakers.

Ich bitte um Entschuldigung — I ask for forgiveness. Written, formal, and used when something has gone properly wrong.

The apology Germans do not make

Worth knowing because it is a real cultural difference rather than a language one.

English speakers apologise as social lubrication — sorry for asking, sorry to bother you, sorry, could I just… Germans mostly do not, and translating that habit directly can make you sound uncertain rather than polite.

A German asking a question at a counter does not open with an apology. They open with Entschuldigung to get attention and then ask the question directly. The directness is not rudeness; it is the absence of a ritual that English happens to have.

The flip side is that when a German does say es tut mir leid, they mean it. The words have not been worn smooth by overuse.

Sorry for being late — a category of its own

Worth separating out, because punctuality carries more weight in Germany than in most places and the apology is correspondingly specific.

Entschuldigung für die Verspätung — sorry for the delay. The standard, and what you say walking into a meeting.

Tut mir leid, ich habe mich verspätet — sorry, I’m late. Slightly more personal.

Der Zug hatte Verspätung — the train was delayed. Said constantly, believed less often than it used to be, and now something of a national joke.

Five minutes late to a German appointment is late. Ten minutes without a message is genuinely rude. And the message beforehand does most of the apologising for you — a text saying ich verspäte mich um 10 Minuten costs nothing and settles it.

Es tut mir leid, taken apart

The phrase repays a moment’s attention because it does not mean what its English translation suggests.

Es — it. tut — does. mir — to me. leid — sorrow. It does sorrow to me.

The German does not say I am sorry. It says the thing itself causes sorrow, and the speaker is where the sorrow lands. That is a subtly different claim, and it is why the phrase works equally well for something you did and something you merely regret — where English needs “I’m sorry” to cover both and ends up ambiguous.

Leid is a real noun with weight: it means grief, sorrow, suffering. Which is why Germans do not attach this phrase to small things.

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