de of het niveau?
het niveau
level
noun · /niˈvoː/
It is “het niveau”. The plural is “de niveaus”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: niveau
Forms
- Article
- het niveau
- Plural
- de niveaus
- Diminutive
- het niveautje
- How common
- among the 3,000 most common Dutch words
In a sentence
Zijn Nederlands is al op een goed niveau.
His Dutch is already at a good level.
Het niveau van deze film was verrassend hoog.
The quality level of this film was surprisingly high.
Welk niveau heeft deze cursus?
What level is this course?
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 niveau” rather than as “niveau” 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.