in Turkish texts
Short in Turkish texts with a translation alongside and comprehension questions. Levels A1–A2: a stock of two or three hundred everyday words is already enough. The translation stands next to it whole, not word by word — a dictionary is still too early at this level: stopping at every other word tears the sentence apart.
All texts
- 📖An ordinary dayA1 · Hello. My name is Elif, I live in Istanbul. In the morning I drink tea and eat bread with…
- 📖At the marketA2 · On Saturday I go to the market with my family. The market is close to our house, ten…
- 📖Saturday shoppingA2 · On Saturday morning I go to the store. My basket is small, but my list is long. Tomatoes…
- 📖My new apartmentA1 · My new apartment is on the third floor. The elevator is broken, so I take the stairs. The…
- 📖I was sick yesterdayA2 · Yesterday evening I started feeling unwell. My head ached and I had a fever. In the…
- 📖Four seasons in IstanbulA1 · There are four seasons in Istanbul. The summer is very hot and humid, and the winter is…
- 📖What does Kerem do for work?A2 · My name is Kerem, I'm an engineer. I work in an office, but two days a week remotely. I…
- 📖Two hours at the airportA2 · I arrived at the airport two hours before the flight. The line was long, but check-in…
- 📖My grandmother's gardenA1 · In my grandmother's garden there are two big trees: an olive and a lemon. At the edge of…
- 📖There's too much black in my closetA2 · There's too much black in my closet, so yesterday I went shopping. First I tried on a…
- 📖My roommate DenizA2 · My roommate Deniz is a very cheerful person. He gets up early in the morning, makes…
- 📖Our kitchenA1 · Our kitchen is small, but it has everything. In the fridge there are cheese, olives and…
- 📖The photo from ten years agoA2 · Yesterday evening a message came to my phone. My friend Emre had sent a link. I opened…
- 📖The fridge isn't workingA2 · My fridge hasn't been working for two days. First I checked the plug, the socket is fine.…
- 📖A concert in a small hallA2 · Last week we went to a concert. The band was three people: guitar, drums and a singer.…
- 📖Two sounds in the neighborhoodA2 · There is a small mosque in our neighborhood. The call to prayer is read in the morning…
- 📖Our two-story houseA1 · Our house has two floors. Downstairs there's a kitchen and a living room, upstairs two…
- 📖Two tests on TuesdayA2 · I looked at the class schedule: on Tuesday there are two tests, math and history. I…
- 📖End-of-month accountingA2 · At the end of each month we write down our income and expenses in a notebook. This month…
- 📖A night in the ERA2 · Yesterday evening I fell down the stairs, and my arm hurt badly. My neighbor called an…
- 📖Before signingB1 · Before starting the new job I read the contract from beginning to end. The duties are…
- 📖First week in the new homeA2 · The move is over, but half the boxes are still unpacked. For the living room we bought a…
- 📖I noticed the sign too lateA2 · We picked up the car in the morning, and the tank was full. Leaving the city, I noticed a…
- 📖I saw it in the feedB1 · Yesterday I saw a news item in my feed: the bridge in the city was supposedly going to…
- 📖My phone was stolenB1 · My phone was stolen on the bus. I went to the police station right away and told what…
- 📖I'm not sure, butB1 · My friend is asking whether to move to a new job, and I'm not sure. On the one hand, the…
- 📖From morning to eveningA2 · First I had breakfast, then packed my bag. Before going out, I turned off the lights and…
- 📖The neighbor downstairsA2 · Our neighbor from the floor below is a man of medium height, gray-haired. His eyebrows…
- 📖We didn't speak for two weeksB1 · Last month my best friend and I quarreled over a trifle. Actually neither of us was…
- 📖My mother's recipeA2 · This dish's recipe is my mother's, and it's very simple. First you peel and chop…
- 📖I kept the receiptB1 · Last week I bought a leather bag at the mall. In the display case it looked very…
- 📖The phone froze againB1 · My phone has been acting strange for a week now: it keeps freezing and gets very hot…
- 📖A summer in the villageA2 · In my grandfather's village there is fog every morning, and in the afternoon it's sunny.…
- 📖Our new neighborhoodB1 · Last month we moved from the city center to the outskirts, because the rent is cheaper…
- 📖What I learned in two yearsB1 · I started learning Turkish two years ago at a language course, then continued online. In…
- 📖My father's storyB1 · My father was born in nineteen sixty in a small village; as a child he would work in the…
- 📖While speakingB1 · The hardest thing about speaking a foreign language is not the words, but the ability to…
- 📖End of the monthA2 · The salary is paid on the fifth of each month, but the money runs out by the twentieth.…
- 📖I started my own businessB1 · Two years ago I worked at a factory; then I quit and opened a small workshop. In the…
- 📖Our neighborhood is changingB1 · Last year trash recycling started in the neighborhood, and three separate bins were…
- 📖The book clubB1 · We meet once a month; everyone comes having read a novel or a story collection. Last…
- 📖The neighborhood matchA2 · On Sunday morning we had a match with the neighborhood team; first we warmed up for half…
- 📖The shelf's measurementsA2 · I wanted to buy a shelf for the living room and first measured the wall. The length came…
- 📖After the illnessB1 · Last winter there was an epidemic at the office, and I caught the virus too. First my…
- 📖Holiday morningA2 · On the holiday morning we got up early and first visited the elders. Grandfather gave the…
- 📖The elevator disputeB1 · At the residents' meeting everyone voiced an opinion, but no one listened to anyone. One…
- 📖The job offerB1 · I was offered a job in another city, and I thought about it for a week. The salary is…
- 📖The old chestA2 · Grandfather's chest stood in the attic; the lid dusty, the edges worn. Inside there was a…
- 📖The stone pathB1 · The path behind the village goes through the forest and descends to the lake. Those going…
- 📖Start-of-month accountingB1 · At the beginning of each month we count the expenses one by one and round the sum. This…
- 📖The renovationB1 · We started renovating the kitchen in February and thought we'd finish in two weeks. First…
- 📖A small research projectB1 · As a whole class we did a simple study: we measured the air in the school yard. Every…
- 📖The village's historyB1 · Our village was founded in the nineteenth century; our ancestors came here from the other…
- 📖The river got pollutedB1 · The factory's wastewater had been flowing into the river for two years; no one took…
- 📖A day at the workshopB1 · At half past seven in the morning we enter the shop floor; first work clothes, then the…
- 📖The lost walletA2 · Once I lost my wallet on the bus; it went like this. Just as I was about to get off, my…
- 📖A difficult neighborB1 · Our neighbor from the top floor is very touchy; he takes even the smallest word…
How to read a text in a language you barely know
First pass — all the way through, without peeking at the translation. The goal is not to understand but to catch familiar words: there will be more of them than you expect, and that feeling matters more than any rule.
Second pass — with the translation beside you. Now it becomes clear what exactly was in the way: an unknown word, a construction you did not get, or just reading speed.
Third pass — all the way through again. The second pass brings noticeably more, and this step is what makes reading useful: it turns analysis into recognition.
Frequently asked
What level do you need to read texts in Turkish?
A1–A2: you know the letters and have a stock of everyday words — about two or three hundred. The translation sits next to it, so an unknown word does not stop the reading.
How many times should you reread the text?
Three times: without the translation, with it, and without it again. The third pass is what all of this is for — the second time you recognize noticeably more.