Once a comparison stretches beyond two nouns — She runs as fast as I do, It's more expensive than I thought — it stops being a phrase and becomes a clause. The thing you compare against is itself a small clause, often with its verb left unspoken. Swedish builds these full comparison clauses with three pieces of machinery: lika ... som / så ... som for equality, -are/mer ... än for inequality, and the correlative ju ... desto for "the more ... the more." Two facts make this a B2 topic rather than a beginner one. First, the second half is a real clause, so it can carry a subject, a verb, and an ellipsis — and which pronoun case to use (jag or mig) becomes a live question. Second, ju ... desto is not a fixed phrase but two clauses bolted together with opposite word order, and getting the verb placement wrong is the signature mistake. This page handles all three, with the word-order details that the basic comparison conjunctions page only previews.
Equality: lika ... som and så ... som
To say two things are equal on some scale, Swedish frames the adjective or adverb with lika ... som ("as ... as") — lika before the quality, som before the standard of comparison.
Hon springer lika fort som jag.
She runs as fast as I (do). lika fort som — the adjective/adverb 'fort' sits between 'lika' and 'som'.
Den här soffan är lika dyr som den vi såg igår.
This sofa is as expensive as the one we saw yesterday. The standard of comparison is itself a clause: 'den vi såg igår'.
There is a second frame, så ... som, which appears mostly in negative comparisons and set expressions — inte så ... som ("not as ... as"). In the affirmative, lika ... som is the default; så ... som affirmatively sounds dated or literary.
Det var inte så svårt som jag hade trott.
It wasn't as hard as I had thought. Negative comparison uses 'så ... som', not 'lika ... som'.
Spring så fort du kan!
Run as fast as you can! Set 'så ... som/du kan' construction — here 'som' is dropped before the clause.
The ellipsis: dropping the second verb
Here is the feature that makes these full clauses. The standard of comparison is a clause, but Swedish (like English) usually leaves out its verb when it would just repeat the first one. Hon är lika lång som jag (är) — "She is as tall as I (am)." The är is recoverable, so it is dropped, and you are left with what looks like a bare pronoun after som.
Hon är lika lång som jag.
She is as tall as I am. The verb 'är' is elided after 'jag' — the full form would be 'lika lång som jag är'.
Min bror äter mer än jag.
My brother eats more than I do. 'än jag (äter)' — the second 'äter' is dropped.
When the verb is not simply a repeat, you keep it — and the second clause is plainly visible:
Hon arbetar hårdare än hon någonsin har gjort förut.
She works harder than she ever has before. The second clause keeps its own verb ('har gjort'), so nothing is elided.
Inequality: -are/mer ... än
For unequal comparison, you compare with the comparative form (the -are ending or mer + adjective) and join the two halves with än ("than"). The cornerstone rule: "than" is always än, never som. English speakers reach for som because it is so frequent elsewhere, but in a "than"-comparison it is simply wrong.
Det är dyrare än jag trodde.
It's more expensive than I thought. 'dyrare än' — the comparative -are plus 'än'. NOT 'dyrare som'.
Tåget är snabbare än bilen på den här sträckan.
The train is faster than the car on this stretch. snabbare än — comparison of two nouns.
Den nya versionen är mer komplicerad än den gamla.
The new version is more complicated than the old one. Long adjective → 'mer ... än' instead of the -are ending.
Which case after än / som: jag or mig?
Because the second half is really a clause with an elided verb, the pronoun in it is logically a subject — so the subject form (jag, han, vi) is the careful, fully-correct choice: längre än jag (är). In everyday speech, though, many Swedes use the object form (mig, honom, oss) by analogy with the pronoun-after-a-word feeling, exactly as English wavers between taller than I and taller than me.
Han är längre än jag.
He is taller than I (am). The careful form: 'jag' is the subject of the elided 'är'. (formal)
Han är längre än mig.
He's taller than me. The object form is very common in speech. (informal)
Both are heard; jag/han/vi is the safe choice in writing and formal speech, mig/honom/oss is unremarkable in conversation. The one place the choice actually changes meaning is when the verb is not elided — then the case is forced by the pronoun's real role: Hon känner honom bättre än jag ("...than I do") versus Hon känner honom bättre än mig ("...than [she knows] me").
Hon känner honom bättre än jag.
She knows him better than I do. 'jag' = the subject of an understood 'känner' → 'better than I know him'.
Hon känner honom bättre än mig.
She knows him better than (she knows) me. 'mig' = object → 'better than she knows me'. Here the case is NOT free — it changes the meaning.
The correlative: ju ... desto
Now the construction that earns this page its B2 label. To say "the more X, the more Y" — a proportional, two-clause comparison — Swedish uses ju ... desto (also ju ... ju, more colloquial). It looks like a frozen phrase, but it is two real clauses with opposite word order, and that asymmetry is the whole trap.
- The ju-clause comes first and is subordinate — so it follows BIFF order: subject before verb, inte before the verb. Ju mer jag tränar...
- The desto-clause comes second and behaves like a main clause with a fronted element (desto + the quality is the first slot) — so its verb inverts to second position, landing before its subject. ...desto starkare blir jag.
That inversion in the second half — blir jag, not jag blir — is the point everyone gets wrong.
Ju mer jag tränar, desto starkare blir jag.
The more I train, the stronger I get. Note the inversion: 'desto starkare BLIR JAG' — verb before subject. NOT 'desto starkare jag blir'.
Ju äldre man blir, desto mindre vet man.
The older you get, the less you know. 'desto mindre VET MAN' — verb 'vet' before subject 'man'.
Ju längre vi väntar, desto dyrare blir biljetterna.
The longer we wait, the more expensive the tickets get. desto dyrare BLIR biljetterna — inversion in the second clause.
Watch the BIFF order in the first clause when a sentence adverb is present — inte sits before the verb, as in any subordinate clause:
Ju mindre du oroar dig, desto bättre kommer det att gå.
The less you worry, the better it will go. First clause 'du oroar dig' is subordinate (BIFF); second clause inverts: 'desto bättre KOMMER DET'.
Common Mistakes
❌ Det är dyrare som jag trodde.
Incorrect — 'than' is always 'än', never 'som'. 'som' is for equality (lika ... som) and relatives, not comparison of inequality.
✅ Det är dyrare än jag trodde.
It's more expensive than I thought.
❌ Han springer lika fort än jag.
Incorrect — equality uses 'lika ... SOM', not 'än'. 'än' only follows a comparative (-are/mer).
✅ Han springer lika fort som jag.
He runs as fast as I do.
❌ Ju mer jag tränar, desto starkare jag blir.
Incorrect — the desto-clause must invert: 'desto starkare BLIR JAG', verb before subject.
✅ Ju mer jag tränar, desto starkare blir jag.
The more I train, the stronger I get.
❌ Ju mer du tränar blir du starkare.
Incorrect — the second clause needs 'desto' (or 'ju') to mark the proportion; you can't just continue with a verb.
✅ Ju mer du tränar, desto starkare blir du.
The more you train, the stronger you get.
❌ Hon är lika lång som mig är.
Incorrect — don't both keep the elided verb AND use the object form. Either elide ('som jag') or, if you keep 'är', use the subject 'jag': 'som jag är'.
✅ Hon är lika lång som jag.
She is as tall as I am. (Elide the verb; 'jag' is the careful choice.)
Key Takeaways
- Equality: lika ... som ("as ... as"); (inte) så ... som in negatives. Inequality: comparative + än ("than").
- The standard of comparison is a clause; its verb is usually elided when it would repeat the first one (lika lång som jag (är)).
- "Than" is än, never som — the single most common transfer error.
- Case after än/som: subject form (jag/han/vi) is the careful choice and is logically correct; object form (mig/honom) is common in speech. When the verb is not elided, the case is forced and changes the meaning.
- ju ... desto is two clauses with opposite word order: the ju-clause is subordinate (subject–verb), the desto-clause inverts (desto starkare blir jag). That second-clause inversion is the make-or-break detail.
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Start learning Swedish→Related Topics
- Comparison Conjunctions (än, som, ju...desto)B1 — How Swedish joins the two halves of a comparison: 'than' is always än (större än), never som; equality is lika ... som ('as ... as', lika stor som) or så ... som; and 'the more ... the more' is the correlative ju ... desto, which hides a real structural trap — the ju-clause is subordinate (BIFF order) and the desto-clause inverts its verb to second position, so the whole thing is two clauses bolted together, not a fixed phrase.
- Comparison: OverviewA2 — The big picture of comparing adjectives in Swedish: most use synthetic endings (-are for the comparative, -ast for the superlative, snabb → snabbare → snabbast), a smaller set uses periphrastic mer/mest (mer intressant, mest komplicerad), and the superlative has both an indefinite (-ast) and a definite (-aste) form.
- Inversion After FrontingA2 — The reflex English speakers must build: whenever any element other than the subject opens a Swedish main clause, the subject moves to AFTER the finite verb. Front a time word, an object, an adverb, or a whole subordinate clause, and inversion is OBLIGATORY (Idag äter vi ute; Den filmen har jag sett; Om du vill, kan vi gå). English inverts only in questions and a few formal frontings — Swedish inverts every time. The trigger is simple: anything non-subject in front → invert.
- Clause Linking: Coordination vs SubordinationB1 — There are exactly two ways to glue clauses together in Swedish, and the choice leaves a VISIBLE fingerprint on word order. Coordination (och, men, eller, så, för) joins EQUAL clauses and each one keeps plain main-clause V2 order. Subordination (att, om, när, eftersom, fast) makes one clause DEPENDENT, switching it to BIFF order — and that whole subordinate clause can be fronted into the main clause's first slot, forcing the main verb to invert. So clause-linking and word order are the same topic seen from two angles.