De liker å danse.

Because it is the first word in the sentence. In Norwegian, just like in English, the first word of a sentence is capitalized.

So in the middle of a sentence, you would normally see de: Jeg vet at de liker å danse. = I know that they like to dance.

In modern Norwegian, de is the usual subject pronoun for they.

So: de liker = they like

This is the form used when de is the subject of the sentence.

Yes. Capitalized De can also be a very formal, old-fashioned way to say you in Bokmål.

So De liker å danse. could theoretically mean:

• They like to dance
• You like to dance (formal/old-fashioned)

In modern everyday Norwegian, this formal De is much less common than du. If a learner sees De at the beginning of a sentence, it is often just de = they, with normal sentence capitalization.

Because liker is the present tense form of the verb å like.

• å like = to like
• liker = like / likes

Norwegian verbs do not change depending on the subject the way English verbs do. So you get:

• jeg liker = I like
• du liker = you like
• han liker = he likes
• de liker = they like

The verb form stays the same.

Å is the infinitive marker, like English to before a verb.

So:

• å danse = to dance

In this sentence, liker å danse means like to dance.

Because after å, Norwegian uses the infinitive form of the verb.

• å danse = to dance
• danser = dance / dances (present tense)

So:

• De liker å danse. = They like to dance.
• De danser. = They dance / They are dancing.

No, this is the normal word order for a simple statement:

subject + finite verb + infinitive phrase

So:

• De = subject
• liker = finite verb
• å danse = infinitive phrase

This is a very basic and common Norwegian sentence pattern.

No. That is one of the nice things about Norwegian grammar.

Unlike English, Norwegian does not usually add different endings for different persons in the present tense. So you get:

• jeg liker
• du liker
• han liker
• vi liker
• de liker

All of them use liker.

This sentence is Bokmål.

In Nynorsk, you would more likely see: Dei likar å danse.

So the Bokmål/Nynorsk comparison is:

• Bokmål: De liker å danse.
• Nynorsk: Dei likar å danse.

A rough English-friendly pronunciation is:

dee LEE-kər aw DAHN-seh

A few notes:

• De sounds roughly like dee
• liker has stress on the first syllable
• å is a separate word and sounds something like aw
• danse has two syllables: DAHN-seh

English spelling cannot show the sounds perfectly, but this gives a useful approximation.

You need å when liker is followed by another verb.

• De liker å danse. = They like to dance.

But if liker is followed by a noun, then there is no å:

• De liker musikk. = They like music.

So å is used here because danse is a verb.