Quantitative er in Dutch: why you say "Ik heb er twee"

Someone asks you how many brothers you have. You say Ik heb twee, because in English "I have two" is a complete answer. A Dutch person will understand you. But it sounds like you stopped halfway through the sentence. The natural answer is Ik heb er twee. That small word er is the quantitative er in Dutch, and it's the one English speakers forget the most.

This article is only about that one job of er. It's narrow, it follows a clear rule, and once you see it you'll start hearing it everywhere.

What the quantitative er does

Dutch uses er for several different jobs. It can mean "there" (Er is koffie, "There is coffee"). It can point to a place (Ik werk er al jaren, "I've worked there for years"). It can replace a preposition phrase (Ze is er blij mee, "She's happy with it"). It can also show up in passive sentences (Er wordt gedanst, "There's dancing"). Those are separate topics, and this piece doesn't re-teach them.

The job we're looking at here is different. It means "of them". It stands in for a noun that you already mentioned.

Here's the rule in one sentence. When you use a number or a quantity word and you leave out the noun, you must add er.

Hoeveel kinderen heb je?

How many children do you have?

Ik heb er twee.

I have two (of them).

The noun kinderen is already clear from the question. So you don't repeat it. But you can't just drop it and leave twee alone. The er takes the place of the missing noun.

You can think of it as the English "of them" that English leaves out. In English you say "I have two." Dutch says, in a very literal way, "I have of-them two."

How to use er in Dutch with numbers and quantity words

Numbers are the most common trigger. But they're not the only ones. Any number or quantity word that stands without its noun needs er.

Numbers:

Heb je een fiets? Ja, ik heb er één.

Do you have a bike? Yes, I have one.

Hoeveel broers heb je? Ik heb er drie.

How many brothers do you have? I have three.

Quantity words like veel (a lot), weinig (few), een paar (a few), genoeg (enough), meer (more), minder (less) and nog (still, more):

Wil je koekjes? Ik heb er genoeg.

Do you want cookies? I have enough.

Heb je boeken? Ja, ik heb er veel.

Do you have books? Yes, I have a lot.

Ik wil er nog één.

I want one more.

And geen (no, none), which is the negative form of een:

Heb je een auto? Nee, ik heb er geen.

Do you have a car? No, I don't have one.

Notice the English in every one of these. English ends the sentence at the number or quantity word: "I have three," "I have enough," "I don't have one." Dutch adds er before it.

The noun is the key

There's a simple test. Is the noun in the sentence? Then you don't need er. Is the noun gone? Then you need er.

So Ik heb er twee broers is wrong if you mean "I have two brothers" or "two of them." The er is there to stand in for broers. If broers is already in the sentence, er has nothing to replace.

There's one catch. A Dutch person could hear that sentence with the "there" meaning of er: "I have two brothers there." That's a different job, and it's not what you wanted to say.

Where er goes in the sentence

The position of er depends on the type of clause. When the number or quantity word stays in the middle of the sentence, er comes before it. (Questions with hoeveel work a bit differently. More on that below.)

In a main clause, er comes after the finite verb. That's the verb that's conjugated for the subject, like heb in ik heb.

Ik heb er twee.

I have two.

If something else is at the front of the sentence, the verb still comes second. Then the subject follows the verb. Er comes after the subject.

Gisteren heb ik er drie gekocht.

Yesterday I bought three.

Here heb is the verb in second place. Ik is the subject. Er comes right after the subject, and then comes drie. The past participle gekocht goes at the end, like normal.

With a modal verb, it works the same way:

Ik wil er nog één.

I want one more.

In a subclause, the verb goes to the end. Here er comes after the subject, and the conjugated verb comes last.

Ik koop er nog één, omdat ik er maar één heb.

I'm buying one more, because I only have one.

Look at the second part: omdat ik er maar één heb. The order is omdat (because), ik (the subject), er, then the number, then heb at the end.

Also notice that small words can sit between er and the number. In er nog één and er maar één, the words nog (more) and maar (only) come in between. The same happens here:

Ik heb er nog twee nodig.

I still need two.

So the safe rule is this. In a main clause, er comes after the verb (and after the subject, if the subject follows the verb). In a subclause, it comes after the subject. In both, it comes before the number. Small words like nog and maar can come between er and the number.

Where English speakers go wrong

There are three common mistakes.

1. Dropping er completely. This is the main one. English says "I have two," so learners say Ik heb twee. It's understandable, but it's incomplete. You may hear Dutch people correct this gently, or just answer you anyway. It's easy to miss because nobody stops you.

2. Thinking er always means "there." Many learners learn er first as "there," as in Er is koffie. Then they see Ik heb er twee and read it as "I have two there." That's not what it means here. It's "I have two of them." One spelling, several jobs. Learn them as separate jobs and you'll get less confused.

3. Using er when the noun is still in the sentence. After learning the rule, some learners overdo it and say Ik heb er twee broers, meaning "I have two brothers." The noun is back, so er has to go.

Edge cases worth knowing

"All of them" doesn't use er

When you mean all of them, Dutch doesn't use er. It uses a pronoun like ze (them).

Ik heb ze allemaal gezien.

I've seen all of them.

Ik heb er drie gezien.

I've seen three (of them).

The difference is that allemaal means the whole group. Er is for a part of the group, a number or amount you pick out. So a number or a quantity word means er, and "all" means ze.

Two ers in one sentence

Sometimes you'll see two er words in the same short sentence.

Er zijn er drie.

There are three of them.

Heads up: this is correct, and it's common. The first er is the "there" in "there are." The second er is the quantitative one, meaning "of them." They look the same but do different jobs. It's not a typo.

Asking "how many?"

The question follows the same pattern. The er goes after the verb and the subject. The word hoeveel (how many) moves to the front, so there's no number right after er this time.

Hoeveel heb je er?

How many do you have?

Hoeveel heb je er nodig?

How many do you need?

What level is this?

Methods don't agree. Some place the quantitative er around B1, and some closer to B2. But you'll hear it from the very first days, in simple answers like Ik heb er twee. So you'll want to recognize it early, even if using it perfectly takes longer.

Putting it together

1. A number or quantity word with the noun left out needs er.
2. Quantity words include veel, weinig, een paar, genoeg, meer, minder, nog and geen.
3. If the noun is in the sentence, don't use er. (Ik heb twee broers.)
4. In a main clause, er comes after the verb, and after the subject if the subject follows the verb. In a subclause, it comes after the subject. In both, it comes before the number. Small words like nog and maar can sit between er and the number.
5. For "all of them," use ze allemaal, not er.
6. Er zijn er drie has two ers, and that's fine.

Go practice this

Pick one or two of these and try them this week.

• Look around your home and count things out loud. Say Ik heb er twee about your chairs, Ik heb er veel about your books, and Ik heb er geen about something you don't own.
• Write five questions that start with Hoeveel, like Hoeveel broers heb je? Then write the answer for each one with er.
• Listen for it in a Dutch podcast or show. Every time someone answers a "how many" question, check if they say er. They almost always do.

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