de of het nadeel?
het nadeel
disadvantage
noun · /ˈnaː.deːl/
It is “het nadeel”. The plural is “de nadelen”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: nadeel
Forms
- Article
- het nadeel
- Plural
- de nadelen
- Diminutive
- het nadeeltje
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
Elk nadeel heeft zijn voordeel.
Every disadvantage has its advantage.
Het grootste nadeel is de hoge prijs.
The biggest disadvantage is the high price.
Er zit één groot nadeel aan dit plan.
There is one big disadvantage to this plan.
Why this article
No rule predicts it
This one has to be memorised. No spelling pattern marks it as neuter, which is exactly why it is worth learning as “het nadeel” rather than as “nadeel” on its own.
The rules that do work
- • Every plural takes “de”, without exception.
- • Every diminutive ending in -je takes “het”, without exception.
- • Nouns ending in -ing, -heid, -tie, -teit or -schap take “de”.
- • Roughly two thirds of all nouns take “de”, so it is the better guess.
Other nouns whose article has to be memorised
Stop guessing de and het
Woordje has a practice mode for exactly this: it shows a noun and asks for the article, and keeps asking until you stop getting it wrong.