Longest words


The longest word in any given language depends on the word formation rules of each specific language, and on the types of words allowed for consideration.
Agglutinative languages allow for the creation of long words via compounding. Words consisting of hundreds, or even thousands of characters have been coined. Even non-agglutinative languages may allow word formation of theoretically limitless length in certain contexts. An example common to many languages is the term for a very remote ancestor, "great-great-.....-grandfather", where the prefix "great-" may be repeated any number of times. The examples of "longest words" within the "Agglutinative Languages" section may be nowhere near close to the longest possible word in said language, but is instead a popular example of a text-heavy word.
Systematic names of chemical compounds can run to hundreds of thousands of characters in length. The rules of creation of such names are commonly defined by international bodies, therefore they formally belong to many languages. The longest recognized systematic name is for the protein titin, at 189,819 letters. While lexicographers regard generic names of chemical compounds as verbal formulae rather than words, for its sheer length the systematic name for titin is often included in longest-word lists.
Longest word candidates may be judged by their acceptance in major dictionaries such as the Oxford English Dictionary or in record-keeping publications like Guinness World Records, and by the frequency of their use in ordinary language.

Agglutinative Languages

Basque

The longest Basque toponym is Azpilicuetagaraicosaroyarenberecolarrea.

Esperanto

The longest official Esperanto roots are 13 letters long, shown here with the added substantive "-o" ending:
Since Esperanto allows word compounding, there are no limits on how long a word can theoretically become. A relatively short example is the 46-letter komencopaleontologiokonservatoriaĉestriĝontajn, which is an adjective that means "about to begin to become the leader of a contemptible palaeontology conservatory".

Estonian

Sünnipäevanädalalõpupeopärastlõunaväsimatus meaning tiredness of a birthday week graduation party which is 46 letters.
31 lettered word of uusaastaöövastuvõtuhommikuidüll meaning morning idyll after the new year.
There is also the 25 long letter word of põllumajandusministeerium which is the ministry of agriculture.
The word kuulilennuteetunneliluuk meaning the hatch a bullet flies out of when exiting a tunnel is 24 letters long and a palindrome and could be one of the longest palindromes.

Finnish

Three examples of long words that have been in everyday use in the Finnish language are kolmivaihekilowattituntimittari which means "three phase kilowatt hour meter", peruspalveluliikelaitoskuntayhtymä and lentokonesuihkuturbiinimoottoriapumekaanikkoaliupseerioppilas "airplane jet turbine engine auxiliary mechanic non-commissioned officer student", an actual military term, although one which has been deprecated. If conjugated forms are allowed, even longer real words can be made. Allowing derivatives and clitics allows the already lengthy word to grow even longer, although the usability of the word starts to degrade. Because Finnish uses free forming of composite words, new words can even be formed during a conversation. One can add nouns after each other without breaking grammar rules.
If one allows artificial constructs as well as using clitics and conjugated forms, one can create even longer words: such as kumarreksituteskenteleentuvaisehkollaismaisekkuudellisenneskenteluttelemattomammuuksissansakaankopahan, which was created by Artturi Kannisto.
The longest non-compound Finnish word recognised by the Guinness Book of Records is epäjärjestelmällistyttämättömyydellänsäkäänköhän, based on the stem järki, and it means: I wonder if – even with his/her quality of not having been made unsystematized
Äteritsiputeritsipuolilautatsijänkä and a defunct bar named after it, Äteritsiputeritsipuolilautatsi-baari, are the longest place names in use.

Hungarian

Megszentségteleníthetetlenségeskedéseitekért, with 44 letters is one example of a long word in the Hungarian language and means something like "for your continued behaviour as if you could not be desecrated". It is already morphed, since Hungarian is an agglutinative language. The language does not have a "longest word" due to its agglutinating nature. It is always possible to construct a longer one with enough creativity. For example, legösszetettebbszóhosszúságvilágrekorddöntéskényszerneurózistünetegyüttesmegnyilvánulásfejleszthetőségvizsgálataitokként, which means "about your investigations of the upgradeability of the manifestation of the syndrome of the neurosis about the need to decide which is the world record of the most complex longest word".
The longest dictionary form word is the word megszentségtelenített, with 21 characters, and it means "desecrated" or "profanized".

Korean

There is some disagreement about what is the longest word in the Korean language. The longest word appearing in the Standard Korean Dictionary published by the National Institute of the Korean Language is 청자양인각연당초상감모란문은구대접 ; Revised Romanization: cheongjayang-in-gakyeondangchosang-gammoranmuneun-gudaejeop, which is a kind of ceramic bowl from the Goryeo dynasty; that word is 17 syllable blocks long, and contains a total of 46 hangul letters. The term 니코틴아마이드 아데닌 다이뉴클레오타이드, a phonetic transcription of "nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide", has a larger number of syllable blocks but a smaller number of letters, and also might not qualify as a single word due to the spaces.
In proper nouns, many Korean monarchs have long posthumous names built from many different Sino-Korean nouns describing their positive characteristics, for example Sunjo of Joseon, whose full posthumous name is the 77-syllable-block 순조선각연덕현도경인순희체성응명흠광석경계천배극융원돈휴의행소윤희화준렬대중지정홍훈철모건시태형창운홍기고명박후강건수정계통수력공유범문안무정영경성효대왕.

Mongolian

A popular example of the longest suffixed word in Mongolian is "Цахилгаанжуулалтыхантайгаа" which is 26 letters long. Here is a table showing, with translations, which suffixes are added.
WordTranslation
Цахилгаанelectricity
Цахилгаанжуулelectrify
Цахилгаанжуулалтelectrification
Цахилгаанжуулалтынelectrification's
Цахилгаанжуулалтыханelectricians
Цахилгаанжуулалтыхантайwith electricians
Цахилгаанжуулалтыхантайгааdo with electricians

Ojibwe

The longest word in Ojibwe language is "miinibaashkiminasiganibiitoosijiganibadagwiingweshiganibakwezhigan", meaning blueberry pie. This literally translates to "blueberry cooked to jellied preserve that lies in layers in which the face is covered in bread".

Turkish

Turkish, as an agglutinative language, carries the potential for words of arbitrary length.
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmişsinizcesine, at 70 letters, has been cited as the longest Turkish word. It was used in a contrived story designed to use this word. The word means "As if you would be from those we can not easily/quickly make a maker of unsuccessful ones" and its usage was illustrated as follows:

Kötü amaçların güdüldüğü bir öğretmen okulundayız. Yetiştirilen öğretmenlere öğrencileri nasıl muvaffakiyetsizleştirecekleri öğretiliyor. Yani öğretmenler birer muvaffakiyetsizleştirici olarak yetiştiriliyorlar. Fakat öğretmenlerden biri muvaffakiyetsizleştirici olmayı, yani muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştirilmeyi reddediyor, bu konuda ileri geri konuşuyor. Bütün öğretmenleri kolayca muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriverebileceğini sanan okul müdürü bu duruma sinirleniyor, ve söz konusu öğretmeni makamına çağırıp ona diyor ki: Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmişsinizcesine laflar ediyormuşsunuz ha?


We are in a teachers' training school that has evil purposes. The teachers who are being educated in that school are being taught how to make unsuccessful ones from students. So, one by one, teachers are being educated as makers of unsuccessful ones. However, one of those teachers refuses to be maker of unsuccessful ones, in other words, to be made a maker of unsuccessful ones; he talks about and criticizes the school's stand on the issue. The headmaster who thinks every teacher can be made easily/quickly into a maker of unsuccessful ones gets angry. He invites the teacher to his room and says "You are talking as if you were one of those we can not easily/quickly turn into a maker of unsuccessful ones, right?"

Other well-known very long Turkish words are:
TurkishEnglish
MuvaffakSuccessful
MuvaffakiyetSuccess
MuvaffakiyetsizUnsuccessful
Muvaffakiyetsizleş' become unsuccessful
Muvaffakiyetsizleştir' make one unsuccessful
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiriciMaker of unsuccessful ones
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileş' become a maker of unsuccessful ones
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştir' make one a maker of unsuccessful ones
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriver' easily/quickly make one a maker of unsuccessful ones
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriverebil' be able to make one easily/quickly a maker of unsuccessful ones
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebil'To be able to not make one easily/quickly a maker of unsuccessful ones
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebilecekOne who is not able to make one easily/quickly a maker of unsuccessful ones
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerThose who are not able to make one easily/quickly a maker of unsuccessful ones
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizThose whom we cannot make easily/quickly a maker of unsuccessful ones
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenFrom those we can not easily/quickly make a maker of unsuccessful ones
Muvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmiş from those we can not easily/quickly make a maker of unsuccessful ones
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmişsinizYou would be from those we can not easily/quickly make a maker of unsuccessful ones
MuvaffakiyetsizleştiricileştiriveremeyebileceklerimizdenmişsinizcesineAs if''' you would be from those we can not easily/quickly make a maker of unsuccessful ones

Non-Agglutinative Languages

Afrikaans

, as it is a daughter language of the Dutch language, is capable of forming compounds of potentially limitless length in the same way as in the Dutch language. According to the Total Book of South African Records, the longest word in the language is
, which means "issuable media conference's announcement at a press release regarding the convener's speech at a secondhand car dealership union's strike meeting". This word, however, is contrived to be long and does not occur in everyday speech or writing.

Bulgarian

The Bulgarian online etymological dictionary claims that longest word in Bulgarian to be the 39-letter-long непротивоконституционствувателствувайте, introduced in the Constitution of Bulgaria of 1947. The word means "do not perform actions against the constitution".

Catalan

The longest word in Catalan is considered to be Anticonstitucionalment, an adverb meaning " against the constitution", however, the scientific word Psiconeuroimmunoendocrinologia, related to endocrinology has been proposed by the University of Barcelona to be the true longest word.

Croatian

The longest known word in Croatian is prijestolonasljednikovičičinima, meaning "to those who belong to the throne successor's little wife." The 31-letter word is the dative case of prijestolonasljednikovičica "the throne successor's little wife" which is the diminutive of prijestolonasljednikovica "the throne successor's wife."

Danish

, like many Germanic languages, is capable of compounding words to create ad hoc compounds of potentially limitless length. Nevertheless, the constructed word – which means "a period of stabilising the planning of a specialist doctor's practice" – was cited in 1993 by the Danish version of the Guinness Book of World Records as the longest word in the Danish language at 51 letters long. It is however not possible to find a text, which actually uses this word, except for in the context of discussing the longest Danish word. Some might have heard about the word "gedebukkebensoverogundergeneralkrigskommandersergentindeø", which is 54 letters long, created by Hans Christian Andersen. This word, however, was made up by H.C. Andersen and has never been accepted into a major dictionary.

Dutch

, like many Germanic languages, is capable of forming compounds of potentially limitless length. The 53-letter word ', meaning "preparation activities plan for a children's carnival procession", was cited by the 1996 Guinness Book of World Records as the longest Dutch word.
The longest word in the authoritative Van Dale Dutch dictionary in plural form is '; 38 letters long, meaning "multiple personality disorders". The entry in the dictionary however is in the singular, counting 35 letters.
The free OpenTaal dictionary, which has been certified by the Dutch Language Union and is included in many open-source applications, contains the following longest words, which are 40 letters long:
The word often said to be the longest in Dutch – probably because of its funny meaning and alliteration – which has also appeared in print, is ' ; counting 53 letters.

English

The 45-letter word pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis| is the longest English word that appears in a major dictionary. Originally coined to become a candidate for the longest word in English, the term eventually developed some independent use in medicine. It is referred to as "P45" by researchers.
Antidisestablishmentarianism |, at 28 letters, is the longest non-coined, non-systematic English word in Oxford Dictionaries. It refers to a 19th-century political movement that opposed the disestablishment of the Church of England as the state church of England.
, at 29 letters and meaning the act of estimating something as being worth so little as to be practically valueless, or the habit of doing so, is the longest non-technical, coined word in Oxford Dictionaries of the English language.

French

German

In German, whole numbers can be expressed as single words, which makes a 65 letter word. In combination with -malig or, as an inflected noun, -maligen, all numbers can be written as one word. A 79 letter word, Donaudampfschiffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft, was named the longest published word in the German language by the 1972 Guinness Book of World Records, but longer words are possible. The word was the name of a prewar Viennese club for subordinate officials of the headquarters of the electrical division of the company named the Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft, which operated steam boats on the Danube river.
The longest word that is not created artificially as a longest-word record seems to be Rinderkennzeichnungs- und Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz at 63 letters. The word means "law delegating beef label monitoring" but as of 2013, it was removed from the books because European Union regulations have changed and that particular law became obsolete, leading to news reports that Germany "had lost its longest word".
In December 2016 the 51-letter word Bundespräsidentenstichwahlwiederholungsverschiebung was elected the Austrian Word of the Year 2016. The jury called it a "descriptive word" which "in terms of its content as well as its length, is a symbol and an ironic form of commentary for the political events of this year, characterized by the very long campaign for the presidential election, the challenges of the voting process, and its reiteration."

Greek

In his comedy Assemblywomen, Aristophanes coined the 173-letter word Lopadotemachoselachogaleokranioleipsanodrimhypotrimmatosilphioparaomelitokatakechymenokichlepikossyphophattoperisteralektryonoptekephalliokigklopeleiolagoiosiraiobaphetraganopterygon, a fictional food dish consisting of a combination of fish and other meat. The word is cited as the longest ancient Greek word ever written.
A modern Greek word of 22 letters is ηλεκτροεγκεφαλογράφημα meaning "electroencephalogram".

Hebrew

The longest Hebrew word is the 19-letter-long וכשלאנציקלופדיותינו, which means "And when our encyclopedias..." The Hebrew word "אנציקלופדיה" is of a European origin. The longest word in Hebrew that doesn't originate from another language is "וכשלהתמרמרויותינו," which crudely means "And when, to our resentments...."
The 11-letter-long וְהָאֲחַשְׁדַּרְפְּנִים is the longest word to appear in the Hebrew Bible. Its meaning is "And the satraps". This word also does not have a Hebrew origin.
Other longest words in Hebrew include:
- "וכשבהשתעשעויותיהם" meaning: "And when they were having fun" or "And while in their playfulness".
-"וכשלהתמרמרויותינו" meaning: "And when our grievances were disrupted".

Icelandic

Icelandic has the ability to form compounds of arbitrary length by stringing together genitives, so no single words of maximal length exist in the language. However, vaðlaheiðarvegavinnuverkfærageymsluskúr and vaðlaheiðarvegavinnuverkfærageymsluskúraútidyralyklakippuhringur are sometimes cited as particularly long words; the latter has 64 letters and means "a keychain ring for the outdoor key of road workers shed in a moor called Vaðlaheiði".
Analysis of a corpus of contemporary Icelandic texts by Uwe Quasthoff, Sabine Fiedler and Erla Hallsteinsdóttir identified Alþjóðaflutningaverkamannasambandsins and Norðvestur-Atlantshafsfiskveiðistofnunarinnar as the longest unhyphenated and hyphenated words.
The longest word occurring at least twice in the University of Leipzig isl-is_web_2015 corpus is Auðmannastjórnvaldaembættisstjórnmálaverkalýðsverðlausraverðbréfaábyrgðarlausrakvótaræningjaaftaníossaspilling.

Italian

The longest word in Italian is traditionally precipitevolissimevolmente, which is a 26-letter-long adverb. It is formed by subsequent addition of postfixes to the original root:
  1. precipitevole: "hasty";
  2. precipitevolissimo: "very hasty";
  3. precipitevolissimevole: " that acts very hastily", ;
  4. precipitevolissimevolmente: "in a way like someone/something that acts very hastily".
The word is never used in every-day language, but in jokes. Nevertheless, it is an official part of Italian language; it was coined in 1677 by poet Francesco Moneti:
The word technically violates Italian grammar rules, the correct form being precipitevolissimamente, which is three letters and one syllable shorter. The poet coined the new word to have 11 syllables in the second verse.
Other words can be created with a similar mechanism starting from a longer root, winding up with a longer word. Some examples are:
The longest accepted neologism is psiconeuroendocrinoimmunologia..
Other long words are:
The longest Lithuanian word is 40 letters long:
The Māori-language 85-letter place name Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu is the longest place name in English-speaking countries and second longest in the world, according to Wises New Zealand Guide and The New Zealand Herald.

Polish

Very long Polish words can be created as adjectives from numerals and nouns. For example, Dziewięćsetdziewięćdziesięciodziewięcionarodowościowego, 54 letters, is the genitive singular form of an adjective meaning roughly "of nine-hundred and ninety-nine nationalities". Similar words are rather artificial compounds, constructed within allowed grammar rules, but are seldom used in spoken language, although they are not nonsense words. It is possible to make even longer words in this way, for example:
Dziewięćsetdziewięćdziesiątdziewięćmiliardówdziewięćsetdziewięćdziesiątdziewięćmilionówdziewięćsetdziewięćdziesiątdziewięćtysięcydziewięćsetdziewięćdziesięciodziewięcioletniego.
One of the longest common words is 31-letter dziewięćdziesięciokilkuletniemu – the dative singular form of "ninety-and-some years old one". Another common long word is pięćdziesięciogroszówka, "a 50 groszy coin".

Russian

Most likely one of the longest Russian words is a chemical term , which contains 55 letters. It was used in Russian patent . This word is an adjective that can describe e.g. a chemical formula. As a noun it's without the last 4 letters.
Another one is , which contains 35 letters. " is an adjective in the bureaucratic language of the 19th century meaning a very polite form of addressing clerks, something like Your Excellency, Your Highness, Your Majesty all together". Its dative singular form, can be an example of excessively official vocabulary of the 19th century.
Numeral compounds can be long as well, such as , which is an adjective containing 46 letters, meaning "1889-micrometers long".

Sanskrit

Sanskrit allows word compounding of arbitrary length. Nouns and verbs can be expressed in a sentence.
The longest sentence ever used in Sanskrit literature is :
In IAST transliteration:
from the Varadāmbikā Pariṇaya Campū by Tirumalāmbā, composed of 195 Sanskrit letters, thus making it the longest word ever to appear in worldwide literature.
Each hyphen separates every individual word this word is composed of.
The approximate meaning of this word is:

Slovak

Traditionally, the word najneobhospodarovávateľnejšieho is considered as the longest Slovak word, but there are some longer artificial words. Most of them are compound adjectives in dative, instrumental or other grammatical case and derived from the iterative or frequentative verbal form or the ability adjective form.
Artificial words, lexically valid but never used in language:
The longest word in Spanish is "esternocleidomastoideitis". Runners-up are "anticonstitucionalmente" and "electroencefalografistas", both 23 letters.
The word "anticonstitucionalmente" is usually considered the longest word in general use. This word can be made even longer by the addition of the absolute superlative suffix, rendering "anticonstitucionalísimamente". Some dictionaries removed its root word in 2005, causing comments about it not "being a valid word anymore" and suggesting the use of "inconstitucional" as a replacement.

Swedish

Realisationsvinstbeskattning is the longest word in Svenska Akademiens Ordlista. It means "capital gains taxation", and is usually shortened to Reavinstskatt.
However, Swedish grammar makes it possible to create arbitrarily long words. One such word is Spårvagnsaktiebolagsskensmutsskjutarefackföreningspersonalbeklädnadsmagasinsförrådsförvaltarens which means: " The manager of the depot for the supply of uniforms to the personnel of the track cleaners' union of the tramway company".

Tagalog

Tagalog can make long words by adding on affixes, suffixes, and other root words with a connector.
The longest published word in the language is “pinakanakakapagngitngitngitngitang-pagsisinungasinungalingan,” with 59 letters. This compound word means “to keep making up a lie that causes the most extreme anger while pretending you are not.”

Vietnamese

is an isolating language, which naturally limits the length of a morpheme. The longest, at seven letters, is, which means "inclined" or "to lean". This is the longest word that can be written without a space. However, not all words in Vietnamese are single morphemes. Indeed, nghiêng can be reduplicated as.
The written language abounds with compound words in which each constituent word is delimited by spaces, just like any freestanding word. Moreover, the grammar lacks inflection to mark parts of speech, and prepositions are often optional. Therefore, the boundary between a word and a phrase is poorly defined. Examples of this ambiguity include:
Unlike locally coined compound words, compound words in Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary are less ambiguous, because of the use of premodifiers as opposed to the native postmodifiers. Long Sino-Vietnamese words include and .
Loanwords and pronunciation respellings from other languages can also result in long words. For example, "consortium" is , and "Indonesia" may be left as-is or spelled . The Encyclopedic Dictionary of Vietnam systematically respells foreign names, introducing long names into an official Vietnamese lexicon:
Long initialisms in Vietnamese include:
In modern Vietnamese, compound words can be identified fairly easily within title cased text: a morpheme that begins with a capital letter followed by one or more morphemes that begin with a lowercase letter. For example, is capitalized as one component within Cộng hòa Xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam.

Welsh