Schadenfreude
- “what is the word for enjoying someone's downfall”
- “schadenfreude meaning”
- “is schadenfreude bad”
- “why do I enjoy other people's failure”
:: COMPARE ::
SchadenfreudevsMitfreude
The short answer
Mitfreude — 'joy-with' — is the real German antonym, and it's a genuine dictionary word with citations back to the 1950s. Schadenfreude gets all the English attention precisely because English borrowed the vice and left the virtue sitting on the shelf.
Side by side
| Aspect | Schadenfreude | Mitfreude |
|---|---|---|
| Joy at | Their misfortune | Their good fortune |
| In German | Common | Real, less common |
| Borrowed by English | Enthusiastically | Never |
| Duden label | None | None |
Which one you meant
Readers who land here meaning Schadenfreude rather than Mitfreude are usually searching for phrases like “what is the word for enjoying someone's downfall”, “schadenfreude meaning”, “is schadenfreude bad”.
Read either one in full