How to type German
The German layout is QWERTZ: Z and Y are swapped compared with an English keyboard, Z on Y and Y on Z.
The umlauts have their own keys: ü on [, ö on ; and ä on ', with Shift for the capitals. ß is on -, and the capital ẞ is AltGr + Shift + -.
Accents for French or Spanish words are dead keys: ´ on = and ` on Shift + =, so ´ then e gives é. The ^ key (`) works the same way.
@ is AltGr + Q, € is AltGr + E and µ is AltGr + M. The brackets are on AltGr + 7, 8, 9 and 0.
German letters and their keys
| Letter | Unicode name | Key |
|---|---|---|
| ä | a with diaeresis | the ä key (US ') |
| ö | o with diaeresis | the ö key (US ;) |
| ß | sharp s | the ß key (US -) |
| ü | u with diaeresis | the ü key (US [) |
Accent and AltGr keys
| Key | What it does |
|---|---|
| ` | dead key: Shift + ´ |
| ´ | dead key: its own key (US =) |
| ^ | dead key: its own key (US `) |
| AltGr | ² ³ { [ ] } \ @ € ~ | µ ẞ |
Layouts on this page
- German (default)
- Swiss German
- German (IBM)
Guides
More keyboards
Layout data: CLDR release-43 keyboards/windows/de-t-k0-windows.xml; CLDR release-43 keyboards/windows/de-CH-t-k0-windows.xml; CLDR release-43 keyboards/windows/de-t-k0-windows-extended.xml. Letter list: CLDR release-43 (de). Letter names: Unicode Character Database. What you type stays in your browser.