aufhören
/ˈaʊ̯fˌhøːʁən/
der (masc.) die (fem.) das (neut.)
Underline = a spelling pattern that usually signals that gender.
Part of the “to stop (an ongoing activity)” register scale — this word sits at A1.
Forms
- present (3rd sg.)
- hört auf
- past
- hörte auf
- perfect
- hat aufgehört
Meaning
-
to stop, to cease
used with mit + dative for stopping an ongoing activity
Similar words
beenden is transitive and deliberate: you beenden a specific task, meeting, or contract (die Sitzung beenden — to end the meeting), treating it as a defined thing being completed. aufhören is used with mit plus an activity, or on its own (Hör auf!), and just means the activity stops — with no implication it was ever a well-defined, completable task. You aufhören smoking; you beenden a contract.
Practice
1 What does aufhören mean?
to stop, to cease
2 Fill the gap: Hör ___ zu weinen.
Full sentence: Hör auf zu weinen. (Stop crying.)
3 Which fingerprint chart matches aufhören?
aufhören: neutral register, core frequency, general domain, neutral connotation.
Usage notes
aufhören looks decomposable into auf + hören ("to hear"), and grammatically it is a separable-prefix verb (hört auf, aufgehört) — but the meaning has drifted far from "to hear"; there's no live sense in which stopping relates to hearing for a modern speaker. Because the pieces aren't independently meaningful the way Hand and Schuh are in Handschuh, this entry skips a compound breakdown rather than force a connection that isn't really there.
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