This page covers the determiners of quantity and distribution: jeder (each / every), mancher (many a / some), and the plural quantifiers einige (some / a few), mehrere (several), viele (many), and wenige (few). The star is jeder — the everyday word for "every" — which has one rule learners constantly break: it is strictly singular. Once jeder goes plural in meaning, German switches the word entirely to alle. We'll also cover jeder's signature use in time expressions (jeden Tag), which rides on the accusative case.
jeder — "each / every" (singular only)
jeder is a der-word taking der/die/das endings, and it means "each" or "every," picking out the members of a group one at a time. Its defining property: it exists only in the singular. There is no plural jeder.
| Masculine | Feminine | Neuter | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | jeder | jede | jedes |
| Accusative | jeden | jede | jedes |
| Dative | jedem | jeder | jedem |
| Genitive | jedes | jeder | jedes |
There is deliberately no plural column — because the plural of "each" is, conceptually, "all." Watch jeder across genders and cases:
Jeder Tag bringt etwas Neues.
Every day brings something new.
Jedes Kind bekommt ein Eis.
Each child gets an ice cream.
Sie spricht mit jedem Gast persönlich.
She speaks with each guest personally.
Tag is masculine nom. → jeder; Kind is neuter nom. → jedes; after dative mit, Gast → jedem. Standard der-word endings throughout.
Because jeder is a der-word, a following adjective takes weak endings:
Jeder neue Tag ist eine zweite Chance.
Every new day is a second chance.
When you need the plural, use alle
There is simply no jede Tage. To express the plural idea, German reaches for alle (see alle, beide, sämtliche):
Alle Schüler haben die Prüfung bestanden.
All the students passed the exam.
The mental model: jeder zooms in on individuals one at a time (jeder Schüler — each student, considered singly); alle views the whole group at once (alle Schüler — the students collectively). English "every" can sometimes feel plural ("everyone passed"), but the German grammar is rigidly singular, so the verb after jeder is also singular: jeder Schüler hat bestanden, not haben.
jeden Tag — the accusative of time
jeder powers one of German's most common time patterns. To say "every day / every week / every year" as a recurring time, German uses the accusative — with no preposition at all:
Ich gehe jeden Tag joggen.
I go jogging every day.
Jede Woche ruft sie ihre Oma an.
Every week she calls her grandma.
Wir fahren jedes Jahr ans Meer.
Every year we go to the seaside.
The endings tell the story: jeden (masculine accusative, der Tag), jede (feminine, die Woche), jedes (neuter, das Jahr). This is the accusative of time — German marks a definite time-span or recurrence with the bare accusative, where English uses a preposition or none. See the accusative of time and measure for the wider pattern, which also gives you letzten Montag ("last Monday") and nächste Woche ("next week").
mancher — "many a / some"
mancher (a der-word) means "many a" or "some/several." In the singular it's slightly literary — mancher gute Vorsatz ("many a good resolution"); in the plural manche it's the everyday "some / several" already covered alongside alle and beide.
Mancher Tourist verläuft sich in der Altstadt.
Many a tourist gets lost in the old town.
Manche Wege sind länger, als sie aussehen.
Some paths are longer than they look.
The plural quantifiers: einige, mehrere, viele, wenige
These four cover the spectrum of vague plural quantity. They are not der-words in the strict sense — they behave like adjectives/indefinite quantifiers and themselves take strong plural endings (-e, -en, -er), and a following adjective agrees in parallel (also strong). The practical upshot: the quantifier and the adjective after it usually carry the same ending.
| Word | Meaning | Sense |
|---|---|---|
| einige | some / a few | a small but real number |
| mehrere | several | more than two, unspecified |
| viele | many | a large number |
| wenige | few | a small number (with a "not many" flavor) |
Sie hatte einige gute Ideen für das Projekt.
She had some good ideas for the project.
Der Redner machte mehrere wichtige Punkte.
The speaker made several important points.
Viele junge Leute ziehen in die Stadt.
Many young people are moving to the city.
Nur wenige alte Häuser sind erhalten geblieben.
Only a few old houses have been preserved.
Notice the parallel endings: einige gute, mehrere wichtige, viele junge, wenige alte — the quantifier and adjective march together with strong endings, because (unlike a der-word) the quantifier doesn't pre-mark the case strongly enough to let the adjective relax.
Common Mistakes
❌ Jede Tage trinke ich Kaffee.
Incorrect — jeder has no plural; use the singular jeden Tag or plural alle Tage.
✅ Jeden Tag trinke ich Kaffee.
Every day I drink coffee.
The double error: pluralizing jeder (impossible) and missing the accusative. "Every day" is the singular accusative jeden Tag.
❌ Ich gehe jeder Tag joggen.
Incorrect — time-when takes the accusative, not the nominative.
✅ Ich gehe jeden Tag joggen.
I go jogging every day.
jeder Tag is the nominative (a subject). For "every day" as a time expression, you need the accusative jeden Tag.
❌ Jeder Schüler haben bestanden.
Incorrect — jeder is singular, so the verb is singular.
✅ Jeder Schüler hat bestanden.
Every student passed.
English "everyone" can pull a plural verb in casual speech, but German jeder is grammatically singular, so the verb is hat, not haben.
❌ Sie hatte einige guten Ideen.
Incorrect — after einige, the adjective takes the strong plural ending too.
✅ Sie hatte einige gute Ideen.
She had some good ideas.
After einige (and mehrere, viele, wenige), the adjective takes the strong ending in parallel: einige gute, not weak guten.
❌ In jede Stadt gibt es ein Museum.
Incorrect — after the dative preposition in, jeder takes the dative.
✅ In jeder Stadt gibt es ein Museum.
There's a museum in every town.
in with a static location takes the dative; feminine dative of jeder is jeder (matching der), so it's in jeder Stadt.
Key Takeaways
- jeder ("each / every") is strictly singular and takes der/die/das endings; for the plural idea, switch to alle.
- The verb after jeder is singular (jeder hat, not jeder haben).
- "Every day / week / year" uses the accusative of time with no preposition: jeden Tag, jede Woche, jedes Jahr.
- mancher = "many a / some"; the plural quantifiers einige, mehrere, viele, wenige take strong endings, and the following adjective takes a strong ending in parallel (einige gute Ideen).
- The formal variant jeglich- ("any / each and every," formal) exists but is rare in speech; jeder is the everyday word.
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- Accusative of Time, Duration, and MeasureB1 — German uses the bare accusative — no preposition — for definite time points, durations, and measurements: jeden Tag, nächsten Montag, einen Monat lang, einen Meter hoch.
- alle, beide, sämtliche, manche, solcheB1 — The quantifying der-words — all, both, all the, some, such — take der-word endings and weak adjectives, with the wrinkle that uninflected 'all' stands before another determiner.
- Determiners: der-words and ein-wordsA2 — The two determiner families that drive German adjective endings — der-words decline like the definite article, ein-words like ein, and each triggers its own adjective pattern.