Every language has many afkortingen (abbreviations) to make… well, everything shorter! But what means what? Below some valuable abbreviations of Dutch words and expressions!

Alstublieft – a.u.b. (also s.v.p.) – please

Afbeelding – afb. – picture

Aanstaande – a.s. – upcoming

Bijvoorbeeld – bijv. – for example

Circa – ca. – approximately

Door middel van – d.m.v. – by means of

Dat wil zeggen – d.w.z. – … which means

En andere – e.a. – and others

en dergelijke – e.d. – and the like

enzovoort – enz. – and so on

in opdracht van – i.o.v. – commissioned by

in plaats van – i.p.v. – in lieu of

in verband met – i.v.m. – in connection with

jongstleden – jl. – recently

m.a.w. – met andere woorden – in other words

m.b.t. – met betrekking tot – with regard to

m.i.v. – met ingang van – as of (e.g. a certain date)

m.n. – met name – in particular

m.u.v. – met uitzondering van – excluding

n.a.v. – naar aanleiding van – following (e.g. an event)

nr. – nummer – number

o.a. – onder andere(n) – including/among other(s)

p.p. – per persoon – per person

t.a.v. – ter attentie van – to the attention of

t.b.v. – ten behoeve van – for the benefit of

t.n.v. – ter name van – in the name of

t.o.v. – ten opzichte van – in comparison to

vlg. – volgende – next

vnl. – voornamelijk – predominantly

z.o.z. – zie ommezijde – see overleaf

z.s.m. – zo spoedig mogelijk – ASAP (as soon as possible).

Now, these official afkortingen are all nice and great, and you will see them in many places. But what about the more colloquial ones, the ones we use to tell how much we love our partner, the ones we use to just quickly write a message? In Dutch, many of these use English afkortingen, that everyone understands.

SMS – text. Well, yes. SMS’en means texting. Although, nowadays, people are more into appen, which refers to sending a message via services like Whatsapp. 

hvj – hou van jou! – I love you!

w8 – wacht – wait/hold on

ff – even – for a moment. This is used a lot, as for example w8 ff, which means: hold on for a sec!

brb – be right back – be right back, or, as you would say in Dutch, ik ben er zo weer.

biw – ben ik weer – I am back again. This would be the message when you come back from a brb.

btw – by the way – by the way. Yes. Dutch use it too!

gtg – got to go – got to go. Yep, again.

There are endless of such English afkortingen that are also used in Dutch. Very useful!

 

What kind of abbreviations do you use in your language?