Final -d or -t? Spelling word endings in Dutch

At the end of a Dutch word, a written d is pronounced like a t: hond (dog) sounds like hont. This makes it hard to hear which letter to write. Yet the spelling still shows d, because the plural honden has a clear d. This page explains how to decide between -d and -t at the end of a word.

Make the word longer — put it in the plural or add -e — and listen to the consonant that appears. That is the letter you write at the end, even if the short form sounds different.

1. Take the word you are unsure about: hond, land, feit.
2. Lengthen it with an ending that starts with a vowel — usually the plural -en or an -e: hond → honden, land → landen, feit → feiten.
3. Listen: do you hear a d or a t? honden and landen have a d, so you write hond and land. feiten has a t, so you write feit (fact).

This works because the d sound only changes to t at the very end of a word. As soon as a vowel follows it (honden), the d comes back and you can hear it.

Verbs follow the same idea. The verb worden (to become) has the stem word (the verb without -en), which ends in d. In the hij/zij form you add -t, so you write both letters: hij wordt. The d belongs to the stem and the -t is the ending — the word sounds like wort but keeps its d.

• ik word — stem only, no -t, but still spelled with d.
• hij wordt, jij wordt — stem word plus the -t ending.
• The same with vinden (to find): ik vind, hij vindt.

That double -dt is a separate topic in itself — see the -dt rule and the quick check in d, t or dt?.

A final b behaves like a final d: at the end of a word it sounds like a p, but the spelling keeps the b when the longer form has one. ik heb (I have) keeps its b because hebben has a b, and krab (crab) keeps its b because the plural is krabben. Lengthen the word the same way and the b comes back.

With d and t, the spelling keeps the original letter (hond, not hont). This is different from v and z: a Dutch word cannot end in v or z, so those letters really do change to f and s in writing — brieven → brief (letter), huizen → huis (house). More on that in why v becomes f, and z becomes s. So lengthening the word answers two different questions: for d/t it tells you which letter to keep; for v/z the short form has already switched to f/s.

Some words sound identical but are spelled differently, and only the longer form tells them apart. hard (hard) and hart (heart) both sound the same, but harder (harder) shows the d while harten (hearts) shows the t. Do not spell by ear alone — lengthen the word and let the consonant reveal itself.