The basic question words — wie, wat, waar, wanneer, hoekom, hoe — get you most of the way through everyday questions, and you can review them on wh-questions. This page handles the trickier interrogatives that English speakers reliably get wrong: watter (which), hoeveel (how much/many), wat vir 'n (what kind of), and hoe combined with an adjective or adverb to ask about degree (hoe oud, hoe vinnig). The common thread is that none of these is a single, isolated word you can just slot in — each one either selects from a set, measures a quantity, or modifies something else, and that changes how you build the sentence.
watter — picking one out of a set
watter means "which," and the key idea is selection from a known set. When you say watter, you are implicitly pointing at a group of options and asking the listener to choose one. It is almost always followed by a noun.
Watter boek lees jy?
Which book are you reading?
Watter kleur hou jy die meeste van?
Which colour do you like the most?
Watter een wil jy hê?
Which one do you want?
That last example is worth pausing on: when there is no noun to attach to, watter takes een (one) as a placeholder — watter een (which one), exactly parallel to English. You cannot leave watter dangling on its own.
The deep contrast English speakers must internalise is watter versus wat. Both can translate as "what" in loose English, but they are not interchangeable. Use watter when you are choosing from a delimited set; use wat when you are asking for open-ended information with no implied options.
Watter restaurant het julle gekies?
Which restaurant did you choose? (from the ones available)
Wat het julle geëet?
What did you eat? (open — no set implied)
wat vir 'n — what kind of
This is the construction that surprises English speakers most, because it is a transparent calque that nonetheless feels backwards. wat vir 'n literally reads "what for a," and it means "what kind of." It asks about the type or nature of something, not which specific item.
Wat vir 'n mens is hy?
What kind of person is he?
Wat vir 'n motor soek jy?
What kind of car are you looking for?
Wat vir 'n weer kry julle daar in die winter?
What kind of weather do you get there in winter?
The pieces stay fixed: wat + vir + the indefinite article 'n + a noun. Do not translate the vir as "for" in your head — it is just part of the frozen frame. (Dutch speakers will recognise this immediately as wat voor een; German speakers as was für ein. It is a shared Germanic idiom that English has simply lost.)
There is a real meaning difference between watter and wat vir 'n. Watter motor? asks you to point at one car among several; Wat vir 'n motor? asks what sort of car — a sports car, a bakkie, an old one. One selects; the other characterises.
Watter motor is joune?
Which car is yours? (point to it)
Wat vir 'n motor wil jy eendag hê?
What kind of car do you want one day? (describe the type)
hoeveel — how much and how many
hoeveel covers both English "how much" (uncountable) and "how many" (countable). Afrikaans does not split the two the way English does, so you never have to decide between them — one word does both jobs.
Hoeveel kos dit?
How much does it cost?
Hoeveel mense kom na die partytjie?
How many people are coming to the party?
Hoeveel suiker wil jy in jou koffie hê?
How much sugar do you want in your coffee?
Notice that the noun after hoeveel stays in its plain form: hoeveel mense (how many people), hoeveel suiker (how much sugar). There is no partitive "of" — you do not say hoeveel van mense. For prices specifically, Hoeveel kos dit? is the standard phrasing; Hoeveel is dit? also works and is slightly more casual.
hoe + adjective/adverb — asking about degree
hoe on its own means "how" (in what manner): Hoe gaan dit? (How are you?). But hoe really comes into its own when you pair it with an adjective or adverb to ask about degree — to what extent something is the case. This maps cleanly onto English "how + adjective."
| Afrikaans | English |
|---|---|
| hoe oud | how old |
| hoe groot | how big |
| hoe ver / hoe vêr | how far |
| hoe lank | how long / how tall |
| hoe duur | how expensive |
| hoe vinnig | how fast |
| hoe dikwels | how often |
Hoe oud is jy?
How old are you?
Hoe ver is dit nog tot by die see?
How far is it still to the sea?
Hoe vinnig kan hierdie kar ry?
How fast can this car go?
Hoe dikwels gaan julle kerk toe?
How often do you go to church?
The structure is simple and rigid: hoe + adjective/adverb in second position, verb third. The adjective stays in its base (uninflected) form — hoe oud, never hoe oue. English speakers occasionally try to mirror "how is it old" by splitting the phrase; in Afrikaans hoe and the adjective travel together as the opening unit, followed straight away by the verb.
Word order recap
All of these behave like ordinary question words: the interrogative phrase fills the first slot, and the finite verb comes immediately second, ahead of the subject. The only twist is that watter, wat vir 'n, hoeveel and hoe + adjective are phrases, not single words, but they still count as one opening unit.
Hoeveel geld het jy nog oor?
How much money do you have left?
Watter trein moet ons vat?
Which train should we take?
Past-tense versions just swap in the auxiliary het with the participle at the end — still no "do":
Wat vir 'n film het julle gister gaan kyk?
What kind of film did you go and watch yesterday?
Common mistakes
❌ Watter is jou naam?
Incorrect — there is no set of names to choose from; use wat.
✅ Wat is jou naam?
What is your name?
❌ Wat boek lees jy?
Incorrect — choosing from a set of books needs watter, not wat.
✅ Watter boek lees jy?
Which book are you reading?
❌ Watter soort mens is hy?
Awkward — 'what kind of' is idiomatically wat vir 'n, not a calque of 'what sort'.
✅ Wat vir 'n mens is hy?
What kind of person is he?
❌ Hoe is jy oud?
Incorrect — hoe and the adjective stay together; the verb comes after them.
✅ Hoe oud is jy?
How old are you?
❌ Hoe veel kos dit?
Incorrect — 'how much/many' is one word, hoeveel.
✅ Hoeveel kos dit?
How much does it cost?
Key takeaways
- watter selects from a set and takes a following noun (watter boek) or een (watter een); wat asks open-ended information. If you can answer "this one," use watter.
- wat vir 'n ("what for a") is the idiomatic "what kind of" — a frozen Germanic frame; do not read vir as "for."
- hoeveel covers both "how much" and "how many"; the noun stays plain, with no "of."
- hoe + adjective/adverb asks about degree (hoe oud, hoe vinnig); the adjective stays uninflected and travels with hoe in the first slot. Hoe laat is the fixed phrase for "what time."
- Everything keeps the standard verb-second order, and there is never any "do."
Now practice Afrikaans
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Start learning Afrikaans→Related Topics
- Question Words: wie, wat, waar, wanneer, hoekom, hoeA1 — How to ask open questions in Afrikaans with wie, wat, waar, wanneer, hoekom/waarom, hoe, watter and hoeveel — question word first, verb second, no 'do'.
- Prepositional Questions: waarmee, waarvan, met wieB1 — How to ask 'with what?', 'about what?', 'for whom?' in Afrikaans — the waar-compounds for things and preposition + wie for people, with no English-style stranding.
- Indirect QuestionsB1 — How to embed a question inside another sentence: yes/no with of ('whether'), wh-questions with the question word, both in verb-final subordinate order.
- Relative Pronouns: wat, wie, waar-B1 — Afrikaans collapses English who/which/that into the single all-purpose relative pronoun wat — for people and things alike — and handles prepositional relatives with met wie for people and solid waar-compounds for things.
- Quantities, Money and MeasurementsB1 — Counting with measure nouns, talking about rand and sent, the decimal comma and space-separated thousands, and hedging amounts with sowat and 'n stuk of.