Learn Norwegian by Frequency: The 1000 Most Common Words in Flashcards

Norwegian is often described as the easiest language for English speakers, and a frequency list shows why: hus is house, bok is book, kald is cold, varm is warm, komme is come. The Norwegian Vocabulary: 1000 Words deck on Flip It (deck code OG2989) takes the thousand most common Bokmål words, ordered from the and and downwards, and puts each one on a card with its English prompt on the front and the Norwegian word on the back.

Cards from the top of the frequency list

The very first card already teaches the most important thing about Norwegian grammar: the is not one word. den goes with masculine and feminine nouns, det with neuter — and as the second row shows, the indefinite article splits the same way (en bil, et hus). Get that pair right early and half of your future noun mistakes disappear.

What the deck covers

Because the order is by frequency, the first hundred cards are grammar in disguise: pronouns (jeg, du, hun, ham, dem, oss, meg), prepositions (til, av, i, med, fra, om, gjennom, rundt), connectors (og, men, fordi, enn, som) and the modal verbs kan, må, vil, burde, kunne, ville. Then come the question words hva, hvor, hvordan, hvorfor, når, hvem; core verbs gjøre, vite, se, finne, bruke, skrive, lære, sove, måle; family (mor, far, bror, barn, familie, venn); time (i dag, morgen, kveld, natt, dag, uke, år, snart, alltid, aldri); and concrete nouns like vann, mat, penger, skole, arbeid, by, land, bil, bok, sol, snø, hav. Numbers appear where they fall in real usage: en, to, tre, ti, hundre.

Two Norwegian-specific tips

1. Watch for words that do three jobs. det appears as the, that and it; noen is both some and any; også covers also and too; kan is can and may. When a card's back matches a card you already know, don't treat it as a duplicate — say a short sentence using each meaning (Det er kaldt / Jeg vet det). This is where English speakers stall in conversation.

2. Let cognates carry the weight, then flag the traps. Roughly a third of these words are transparent (komme, hus, bok, mor, far, vann, land). Mark them as easy in the first session so Flip It stops showing them, and spend your review time on the false friends and shape-shifters: by means city, fly means plane, gå is walk/go but never go to in the English sense, and mange (many) is unrelated to anything you know.

Working through the deck

Cards are ranked by how often you'll actually see the word, so there is no need to shuffle: 30 new cards a day means the first two weeks give you the 400 words that make up most of any Norwegian text, and the rest follow in about a month. Flip the deck to Norwegian → English once a week to check that you can read what you can now say.

Log in to Flip It and look for Norwegian Vocabulary: 1000 Words (code OG2989) in the library.