What's the difference between want and omdat?

(Looking for a quick, grammatical summary? Read the summary below!)

There are two words for "because" in Dutch: want and omdat.

When should you use want and when should you use omdat, you might ask? This is a very common question amongst new learners of Dutch, because the distinction is not immediately obvious. So allow us to explain, in simple terms, the tricky difference between these two words.

Before we delve into the true distinction between the two, a quick note regarding word order: as in English, both versions of "because" are used to connect two clauses (part of a sentence containing a verb). Have a look at the difference between the two sentences below.

You'll note that the word order is not the same in these two sentences. With omdat, an inversion takes place, altering the word order to Subject-Object-Verb. With want, it remains the usual Subject-Verb-Object. This change always take place — try to memorise some simple sentences to develop a feel for this.

‘Omdat’—‘want’ difference

Want

The word want is a coordinating conjunction. It's used when providing a subjective justification for an action; to give a rationale for what you've just said. Consider the following example:

In this example, the speaker is giving his personal and subjective justification for having eaten lots of food: he or she was hungry, and therefore decided to eat to satiate their appetite. Therefore, they're using want to explain their behaviour.

Omdat

Omdat is a subordinating conjunction and, conversely, is used when providing an objective explanation for an action; when providing a reason/cause for the action or state of affairs you've just described. Let's look at another example:

Here, an objective explanation is being provided. We're being given the actual objective cause for his smiling: he's happy! Because this sentence is using "because" to share the objective reason for the man's smiling, we use omdat.

Example sentences

To get a better understanding of the subtle difference, let's look through some more examples.

At first glance, you might ask yourself why this sentence uses want. This sentence doesn't appear to be "subjective" — after all, a dark sky is objectively likely to herald rain, right?

Want is used here because the speaker is justifying what he's just said; although rain indeed tends to follow a dark sky, the speaker isn't giving us a cause, and thus must use want here.

Another example:

In this example, both words can be used. Note, however, that the choice of word causes the meaning of each sentence to be subtly different. In the first sentence, the speaker is telling us why they said they've put the jumper on, with want. In the second sentence, the speaker is using omdat to give us the cause for their decision to switch the heater on: the cold weather.

Summary