Questions & Answers about Es schneit oft und der Schnee ist schön.
Why do we use es in Es schneit oft? Who or what is it?
Just like in English, German uses the word es (it) to talk about the weather. There is no actual object doing the snowing; es acts as an impersonal subject because grammatically, every German sentence needs a subject.
What is the difference between schneit and Schnee?
schneit is the verb meaning "snows" (from the base verb schneien). Schnee is the noun meaning "snow". Notice that the noun Schnee is capitalized, which is a strict rule for all nouns in German!
Could I say Es oft schneit to match the English "It often snows"?
No, because German has a strict rule: the conjugated verb must go in the second position of a normal statement. Here, Es is position 1, so the verb schneit must be position 2. The adverb oft (often) has to wait until after the verb.
Does the word und change the word order in the second half of the sentence?
No. The word und (and) simply glues two regular sentences together. It acts as a bridge and does not count as taking up a position in the second sentence. Because of this, the second part starts normally with the subject der Schnee in position 1, followed by the verb ist in position 2.