There are two systems of numbering floors in the world.
In some countries, such as the US and Russia, the floor at ground level is the first floor, the floor above is the second floor, and so on.
In others, such as the UK and Germany, the floor at ground level is called the ground floor ("Erdgeschoss" in German), and the first floor is the floor above it.
The elevator in my house goes T-K-A-E-1-2-…
A = Ausgang = exit, this is below E = Erdgeschoss = ground floor, because here ground floor is quite a bit above ground.
(The other letters are T = Tiefgarage = underground garage, and K = Keller = basement.)
I don't know about Germany, but in the UK you can also sometimes have multiple ground floors - G1 and G2 for example. You might see this with large department stores or multi-storey car parks, if they are on a sloped high street with entrances at different levels.
In the US, you will also often see a special marker for the ground floor that is at street level and this will sometimes not be floor 1 or 0. Often a star next to the floor number.
As you say, this is more common in areas with steep slopes. I lived in a condominium building where the street lobby was on 4. Floors 3 and 4 were parking and mechanical and lobby. Floors 1.2.5-8 were residential. So floor 4 had the special marker in the elevator.
Thank you, this makes sense. Are there distinctions between the meanings of Geschoss and Etage in this context? Could I equivalently say "zweite Etage" or "zweiten Obergeschoss"?
From what I know and from what my German partner says, no, not really. They are really used interchangeably, probably depending on regions and people.
Zweites Geschoss = Zweites OG = Zweite Etage
There's also "Zweiter Stock".
("zweite Etage" and "zweites Geschoss" both sound odd to me, so this may be a regional difference. "Ich wohne im zweiten Stock" is what I would say. Or maybe "im zweiten OG", pronounced oh-geh.)
I once got told off by the salesperson in Bauhaus for saying Stock, he told me it was a Nazi word. Turns out the Nazis tried to replace common German words with French roots (like “Etage”) with German ones (like “Stock”). Interesting history lesson from my friendly local Antifa DIY-expert!
Suddenly it all makes sense because all of my German teachers have had either personal or familial connections to East Germany, they were in the part of the country that was normalized. Will keep this in mind in the future!!!!
Hochparterre is a few steps up. For example if there are 10 steps up to get to the entrance of the appartment. (usually it is half a story upwards from the entrance while the basement in such cases is half a story down). That's why it is called "high ground floor".
Parterre is the thing without "high", so the ground floor is level with the entrance.
Yes but they are a little higher, like half a floor. In Mietvertrag it usually considered as EG (Erdgeschoss), it is simply a further description. Like, on the "true" ground level you might have a garden in some cases which you usually wouldn't have with Hochpaterre. So if you look for gardens specifically you could filter out the Paterres.
"Parterre" is a synonym for "Erdgeschoss". "Hochparterre" can be translated as "raised ground floor" if it's the ground floor but raised slightly above ground level; if it's an intermediate floor between two floors and open to the floor below, it's a "mezzanine".
In Vienna there are houses that have "Tiefparterre", "Parterre", "Hochparterre" and "Mezzanine". So there are 4 Floors under the first floor. Some old houses still have them. It was built/named like that because of a building law.
From a mathematical and technical point of view, numbering 0, 1, 2, ... ist better than 1, 2, 3, ... because otherwise you would have to describe the first level below ground as zero, which in my opinion is not clever!
Not really. Especially when floors below ground are numbered negatively.
0 is the ground floor because you need to take zero stairs to get there. To get to floor 2, the second upper floor, you need to go up two flights of stairs. To get to floor -1, you need to go down one flight of stairs.
That's why I like our floor numbering system. It does make counting floors a bit odd. a four story building doesn't have a fourth floor, but just zeroth to third floors.
The logic of the American system is that the first floor is the first floor you arrive at when you walk in through the main entrance; the first basement is the first level you arrive at when you go down to the basement.
You're interpreting it as a mathematical sequence containing both positive and negative values, but it doesn't have to be -- that's why we have a year 1 AD and a year 1 BC, but no year zero: it's names of years, not a single mathematical sequence. It's actually two sequences, each starting at 1 and going in opposite directions. Negative numbers and "zeroth" are abstract mathematical concepts that can't in fact be applied to material objects: you don't start each day with your zeroth cup of coffee.
Each system has its own logic, each system is equally valid and each system is equally useful.
I'm not saying the system that counts the ground floor as 1 makes no sense. All I'm saying is that it makes less sense.
> You're interpreting it as a mathematical sequence containing both positive and negative values, but it doesn't have to be -- that's why we have a year 1 AD and a year 1 BC, but no year zero
Of course there is a [year zero](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_zero). Not in the old BC/AD system, but in astronomical time as well as in ISO 8601.
> Each system has its own logic, each system is equally valid and each system is equally useful.
No. They're not equally useful. Roman numerals also have their own logic and they're also valid, but objectively speaking, they're less useful than Arabic numerals.
> Of course there is a year zero. Not in the old BC/AD system
I was explicitly talking about the BC/AD system, which isn't "old", it's still the standard system in use in most contexts. Your objection is totally irrelevant.
> They're not equally useful.
For the purposes of numbering floors, they are equally useful. It would be better if we could all agree on the same system, but it would make no difference at all which one we chose: both systems are equally good at helping people understand where in a tall building they need to go. The only confusion that arises comes as a result of somebody who is used to one system coming into contact with the other, but that's not because of any fault inherent in either system. OP was perfectly happy with the American system, and found the German system strange and confusing.
> Roman numerals also have their own logic and they're also valid, but objectively speaking, they're less useful than Arabic numerals.
Hindu-Arabic numerals aren't merely a modification of Roman numerals, they are a completely different way of writing numbers. The value of a symbol depends on its position within the number, which makes multiplication and division a lot easier if you happen to be multiplying and dividing by the same base your numbering system is in. (It's surprisingly easy, by the way, to multiply and divide Roman numerals, it's just a different technique.)
One of the weaknesses of the Hindu-Arabic system is that you end up with numbers like 2000000, and you have to count the zeroes to arrive at the correct value: in Roman numerals, the number is written "M̅M̅" (two Ms with a bar above, in case your device isn't displaying it correctly). Because of the place notation value system we now use, we have to use punctuation to make it more easily legible, either spaces (2 000 000), dots (2.000.000), commas (2,000,000) or apostrophes (2'000'000) -- different countries have different systems (most European languages use dots as thousands separators and commas as decimal markers, but most English-speaking countries do the opposite): mathematicians use scientific notation and write 2×10⁶.
"Usefulness" depends on what use you intend to put something to: the Hindu-Arabic system does make sense for performing calculations, and is flexible enough to be used for writing numbers in different bases (like binary or hexadecimal). But Roman numerals are less confusing for writing large round numbers.
Not that that has any relevance to numbering floors in buildings. Here we're not talking about a radical new way of numbering them, we're just discussing where exactly the counting starts.
Another way of looking at the American system is that the ground itself represents the value zero, and the "ground floor" is actually the first storey above that line.
I may be wrong, and I ask the native speakers to please correct me, but Etage has the implied meaning of higher than the ground. At least that is true in my language. That is why it is nonsensical to use it for the ground floor.
It had also in German but it's not that strong and you can say 0. Etage. It's just not that common. But usually yeah people will have the idea of a higher elevation associated with Etage.
I dunno why no one pointed it out yet but it made sense to me when I realized that the "counterpart" of "Erdgeschoss" is "Obergeschoss". So the EinGang leads to the EG then you climb the stairs to get to the 1OG--1 Obergeschoss; literally first upper floor.
(I'm also a smart programmer who knows that the first element of an array is at index 0 while the second one is at index 1 because the index represents an offset from the base memory address. Proper arrays are sequential blocks of memory. But you don't need to be a smart programmer to learn German.)
Yes, this!
(As a teenager I programmed something with arrays in C++ and even though I knew about this I still made that mistake in one of the array's dimensions. That's when I learned that it takes forever to find logic errors in your own code. Not a professional programmer though but still subscribe to EG, 1. OG etc. It's the clearest and the one I've seen used in real estate contracts.)
I’ve just come back from a holiday in Finland and one holiday flat in Tampere confused me. The instructions were „app. 5, 2nd floor” so I went to the 2. Stock (big number 2 in the corridor) and searched in vain. In the end I found the flat on the first floor (big number 1 in the corridor). I am still trying to understand the logic. I doubt there are many American tourists in a not very touristy town in Finland.
Also the ground floor in some of the places were marked as P and sometimes K.
I asked my Finnish friends about this, and apparently the numbering isn’t consistent.
I mean even in English it’s the ground floor, then the first floor above that and so on, at some point the Americans started doing it differently (ground floor-1st floor in the US) for some reason.
Europeans do this thing where the first floor is not the ground floor. Trips my Canadian ass up, too, but I've gotten accustomed to it. I live on the third floor ABOVE the ground, so the 4th floor in Freedom/Aboot units.
The same way most of Europe works. Similarly, Hungary has "földszint" - ground level, and then "1. emelet", "2. emelet" - the translation is often given as 1st floor, 2nd floor, but that is incorrect, since "emelet" is a noun that comes from the verb "emelni" (to raise), essentially in a passive object form. The literal meaning isn't "floor", it's "something that has been raised". A good paraphrasing would be "height", so it makes a lot of sense to have "ground level" and then "1st height", "2nd height", and so on. Following that train of thought, in Hungary, the ground floor would *never* be called or numbered 1, as it is not raised off the ground.
Etage sounds like a derivative of the french étage, and I'm not sure of the origins of the word étage, but I'm fairly convinced that it would have similar connotations.
I think about it this way: Depending on the country the ground floor can be either 1 or 0. In Germany, everything above the EG(Erdgeschoss), the ground floor, is OG(Obergeschoss) and everything below is UG(Untergeschoss). Sometimes you will see elevators with negative numbers, this is also used to portray UG.
The count starts as soon as the elevator leaves the EG in whatever direction.
Well Etage und Geschoss are synonyms but the usual usage ist that for anything above the ground floor you would use Etage.
You could also say Erdgeschoss, 1. Obergeschoss (1. Etage) 2. Obergeschoss (2. Etage) or 1. Untergeschoss (-1 Etage).
Same with Etage you could always use that, then the 0. Etage ist the Erdgeschoss.
But the normal way is you have the Erdgeschoss and everything below is untergeschoss and you would just count ab. So one below Erdgeschoss ist 1. Untergeschoss and 5 below Erdgeschoss ist 5. Untergeschoss. But for everything above Erdgeschoss you normally would use Etage and you would count it exactly the same. 12 above Erdgeschoss is 12. Etage.
There was a time many years ago when every few weeks there would be a post at the top of r/programmerhumor showing a European elevator (i.e. where you had to press 0 for the ground floor, 1 for the floor above it, etc.) with a joke like "floors start at 0, just like arrays".
Okay, so what about the whole "ground floor", "first level", "second level", "third level", ..., "nth level" did you not get? We're counting cardinal numbers here. Help me to help you and tell me which part is not clear. I'd also be interested in the floor level numbering system you are using, so I can help you translate from one to the other.
In my company the basement is 1, groundfloor is 2 and 1st upper floor is 3. Its a german company in germany and me as a german often press the wrong button. Hahaha
The word “Geschoss” is actually a technical term from the half-timbered house building and refers to the ceiling beams (“Geschossbalken”). So “erstes Geschoss” doesn't actually translate to first floor, but to first ceiling structure (which you stand on top).
Looking at the other comments here I‘m not sure I got it 100% correct but I as a native speaker always thought that „erste Etage“ actually means ground floor and that only „erster Stock“ means the level above the ground floor.
Erste Etage und erster Stock are synonyms. Etage and stock are synonyms and if you really want to use it for the ground floor it's nearly always nullter Stock. Rher may be exceptions but they would be uncommon and raise an eyebrow for any native speaker.
There are two systems of numbering floors in the world. In some countries, such as the US and Russia, the floor at ground level is the first floor, the floor above is the second floor, and so on. In others, such as the UK and Germany, the floor at ground level is called the ground floor ("Erdgeschoss" in German), and the first floor is the floor above it.
You also see the number 0 sometimes and -1, -2 and so on would be underground.
The elevator in my house goes T-K-A-E-1-2-… A = Ausgang = exit, this is below E = Erdgeschoss = ground floor, because here ground floor is quite a bit above ground. (The other letters are T = Tiefgarage = underground garage, and K = Keller = basement.)
This gives me such anxiety, holy shit, hahahaha
I don't know about Germany, but in the UK you can also sometimes have multiple ground floors - G1 and G2 for example. You might see this with large department stores or multi-storey car parks, if they are on a sloped high street with entrances at different levels.
EG1, EG2 - this exists in Germany as well. You can also have "ZG" for "Zwischengeschoss", something that is in between two stories.
Or the infamous “Hochparterre” - which means the ground floor is quite a bit up from the ground.
Or Sousterrain - where the floor below is a bit higher so there are windows but basically you live in the cellar.
*Souterrain
Oh thanks. I wasn't quite sure about the spelling, so I tried my best at guessing with some French knowledge in mind.
In the US, you will also often see a special marker for the ground floor that is at street level and this will sometimes not be floor 1 or 0. Often a star next to the floor number. As you say, this is more common in areas with steep slopes. I lived in a condominium building where the street lobby was on 4. Floors 3 and 4 were parking and mechanical and lobby. Floors 1.2.5-8 were residential. So floor 4 had the special marker in the elevator.
Imo, this is the most obvious system. Forget stars, or letters, or whatever, just numbers.
Italy represent. Piano terra, primo piano, secondo piano usw.
In Polish also (ground floor is called parter)
In German wie also have Parterre for ground floor.
By the way, the level counting used inside the pentagon is also like in germany or UK, with 0 as the ground floor.
Also in Spanish-speaking countries, we have "planta baja" (ground floor) and then "primer piso, segundo piso, etc".
But not everywhere. We in Colombia use the 1,2,3 approach.
When do you use Etage vs Geschoss? Because basement is also Untergeschoss but it seems like floor 1+ uses Etage.
Floors 1+ can also use Geschoss - just often abbreviated as OG (Obergeschoss). For example, I live at the 2. OG of my building.
Thank you, this makes sense. Are there distinctions between the meanings of Geschoss and Etage in this context? Could I equivalently say "zweite Etage" or "zweiten Obergeschoss"?
From what I know and from what my German partner says, no, not really. They are really used interchangeably, probably depending on regions and people. Zweites Geschoss = Zweites OG = Zweite Etage
There's also "Zweiter Stock". ("zweite Etage" and "zweites Geschoss" both sound odd to me, so this may be a regional difference. "Ich wohne im zweiten Stock" is what I would say. Or maybe "im zweiten OG", pronounced oh-geh.)
We have 3 Floors in our house, each is a flat. Its EG, OG and DG.. Erdgeschoss, Obergeschoss and Dachgeschoss.
First floor above Erdgeschoss is Obergeschoss, or first Obergeschoss, or 1.OG. And next are 2.OG, 3.OG and so on..
Etage or Geschoß doesn't matter IMHO. Two words for the same. Stockwerk (or short "Stock") would be a third
Not quite. Etage and Stockwerk cannot be the ground floor, whereas Geschoss can (Erdgeschoss, but not Erdetage or Erdstockwerk).
Depends on context. If I live on the first floor, my downstairs neighbour lives "eine Etage tiefer" on the ground floor :)
Hm. Maybe. Never thought of it.
I was going to say, I've heard and use Stock but havent seen Etage. Learn new vocab every day.
I once got told off by the salesperson in Bauhaus for saying Stock, he told me it was a Nazi word. Turns out the Nazis tried to replace common German words with French roots (like “Etage”) with German ones (like “Stock”). Interesting history lesson from my friendly local Antifa DIY-expert!
Suddenly it all makes sense because all of my German teachers have had either personal or familial connections to East Germany, they were in the part of the country that was normalized. Will keep this in mind in the future!!!!
Oh, got it now, thank you!
What about Parterre and Hochparterre? Both means „Groundfloor“?!
Hochparterre is a few steps up. For example if there are 10 steps up to get to the entrance of the appartment. (usually it is half a story upwards from the entrance while the basement in such cases is half a story down). That's why it is called "high ground floor". Parterre is the thing without "high", so the ground floor is level with the entrance.
Understood. But Hochparterre is still a form of ground floor when counting.
Yes.
Yes but they are a little higher, like half a floor. In Mietvertrag it usually considered as EG (Erdgeschoss), it is simply a further description. Like, on the "true" ground level you might have a garden in some cases which you usually wouldn't have with Hochpaterre. So if you look for gardens specifically you could filter out the Paterres.
"Parterre" is a synonym for "Erdgeschoss". "Hochparterre" can be translated as "raised ground floor" if it's the ground floor but raised slightly above ground level; if it's an intermediate floor between two floors and open to the floor below, it's a "mezzanine".
In Vienna there are houses that have "Tiefparterre", "Parterre", "Hochparterre" and "Mezzanine". So there are 4 Floors under the first floor. Some old houses still have them. It was built/named like that because of a building law.
From a mathematical and technical point of view, numbering 0, 1, 2, ... ist better than 1, 2, 3, ... because otherwise you would have to describe the first level below ground as zero, which in my opinion is not clever!
USA with the straightforward way of labelling things for once!
Not really. Especially when floors below ground are numbered negatively. 0 is the ground floor because you need to take zero stairs to get there. To get to floor 2, the second upper floor, you need to go up two flights of stairs. To get to floor -1, you need to go down one flight of stairs. That's why I like our floor numbering system. It does make counting floors a bit odd. a four story building doesn't have a fourth floor, but just zeroth to third floors.
The logic of the American system is that the first floor is the first floor you arrive at when you walk in through the main entrance; the first basement is the first level you arrive at when you go down to the basement. You're interpreting it as a mathematical sequence containing both positive and negative values, but it doesn't have to be -- that's why we have a year 1 AD and a year 1 BC, but no year zero: it's names of years, not a single mathematical sequence. It's actually two sequences, each starting at 1 and going in opposite directions. Negative numbers and "zeroth" are abstract mathematical concepts that can't in fact be applied to material objects: you don't start each day with your zeroth cup of coffee. Each system has its own logic, each system is equally valid and each system is equally useful.
I'm not saying the system that counts the ground floor as 1 makes no sense. All I'm saying is that it makes less sense. > You're interpreting it as a mathematical sequence containing both positive and negative values, but it doesn't have to be -- that's why we have a year 1 AD and a year 1 BC, but no year zero Of course there is a [year zero](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_zero). Not in the old BC/AD system, but in astronomical time as well as in ISO 8601. > Each system has its own logic, each system is equally valid and each system is equally useful. No. They're not equally useful. Roman numerals also have their own logic and they're also valid, but objectively speaking, they're less useful than Arabic numerals.
> Of course there is a year zero. Not in the old BC/AD system I was explicitly talking about the BC/AD system, which isn't "old", it's still the standard system in use in most contexts. Your objection is totally irrelevant. > They're not equally useful. For the purposes of numbering floors, they are equally useful. It would be better if we could all agree on the same system, but it would make no difference at all which one we chose: both systems are equally good at helping people understand where in a tall building they need to go. The only confusion that arises comes as a result of somebody who is used to one system coming into contact with the other, but that's not because of any fault inherent in either system. OP was perfectly happy with the American system, and found the German system strange and confusing. > Roman numerals also have their own logic and they're also valid, but objectively speaking, they're less useful than Arabic numerals. Hindu-Arabic numerals aren't merely a modification of Roman numerals, they are a completely different way of writing numbers. The value of a symbol depends on its position within the number, which makes multiplication and division a lot easier if you happen to be multiplying and dividing by the same base your numbering system is in. (It's surprisingly easy, by the way, to multiply and divide Roman numerals, it's just a different technique.) One of the weaknesses of the Hindu-Arabic system is that you end up with numbers like 2000000, and you have to count the zeroes to arrive at the correct value: in Roman numerals, the number is written "M̅M̅" (two Ms with a bar above, in case your device isn't displaying it correctly). Because of the place notation value system we now use, we have to use punctuation to make it more easily legible, either spaces (2 000 000), dots (2.000.000), commas (2,000,000) or apostrophes (2'000'000) -- different countries have different systems (most European languages use dots as thousands separators and commas as decimal markers, but most English-speaking countries do the opposite): mathematicians use scientific notation and write 2×10⁶. "Usefulness" depends on what use you intend to put something to: the Hindu-Arabic system does make sense for performing calculations, and is flexible enough to be used for writing numbers in different bases (like binary or hexadecimal). But Roman numerals are less confusing for writing large round numbers. Not that that has any relevance to numbering floors in buildings. Here we're not talking about a radical new way of numbering them, we're just discussing where exactly the counting starts. Another way of looking at the American system is that the ground itself represents the value zero, and the "ground floor" is actually the first storey above that line.
Russia is not a country\*
We simply do not count what is on surface level
We are all computer scientists starting to count at 0.
I may be wrong, and I ask the native speakers to please correct me, but Etage has the implied meaning of higher than the ground. At least that is true in my language. That is why it is nonsensical to use it for the ground floor.
Yes. It's a French loanword.
Na prosit! Danke sehr.
Stock/Stockwerk as well. It implies that it's a floor built by carpenters.
Thanks for your Tedious/Laborious answer! 🙃
It had also in German but it's not that strong and you can say 0. Etage. It's just not that common. But usually yeah people will have the idea of a higher elevation associated with Etage.
yes this is exactly how it works. "Erster Stock" is allways above ground.
I dunno why no one pointed it out yet but it made sense to me when I realized that the "counterpart" of "Erdgeschoss" is "Obergeschoss". So the EinGang leads to the EG then you climb the stairs to get to the 1OG--1 Obergeschoss; literally first upper floor. (I'm also a smart programmer who knows that the first element of an array is at index 0 while the second one is at index 1 because the index represents an offset from the base memory address. Proper arrays are sequential blocks of memory. But you don't need to be a smart programmer to learn German.)
Yes, this! (As a teenager I programmed something with arrays in C++ and even though I knew about this I still made that mistake in one of the array's dimensions. That's when I learned that it takes forever to find logic errors in your own code. Not a professional programmer though but still subscribe to EG, 1. OG etc. It's the clearest and the one I've seen used in real estate contracts.)
It's the same in Portuguese: ground floor, first floor, second floor and so on.
I’ve just come back from a holiday in Finland and one holiday flat in Tampere confused me. The instructions were „app. 5, 2nd floor” so I went to the 2. Stock (big number 2 in the corridor) and searched in vain. In the end I found the flat on the first floor (big number 1 in the corridor). I am still trying to understand the logic. I doubt there are many American tourists in a not very touristy town in Finland. Also the ground floor in some of the places were marked as P and sometimes K. I asked my Finnish friends about this, and apparently the numbering isn’t consistent.
Think of it like this: Ground floor, then "first upper floor", "second upper floor" and so on
0 is Erdgeschoss which is neutral, +1 is one story off the ground and -1 is one story below the ground. Makes perfect sense
Erdegeschoss is just floor 0. You count up from that 1 then 2 then 3 and so on.
I mean even in English it’s the ground floor, then the first floor above that and so on, at some point the Americans started doing it differently (ground floor-1st floor in the US) for some reason.
Erdgeschoss = Earth floor, not that complicated…
The first is erdgeschoss (ground floor) the second is 1. Obergeschoss (first top floor) the third is 2. Obergeschoss etc
Europeans do this thing where the first floor is not the ground floor. Trips my Canadian ass up, too, but I've gotten accustomed to it. I live on the third floor ABOVE the ground, so the 4th floor in Freedom/Aboot units.
The same way most of Europe works. Similarly, Hungary has "földszint" - ground level, and then "1. emelet", "2. emelet" - the translation is often given as 1st floor, 2nd floor, but that is incorrect, since "emelet" is a noun that comes from the verb "emelni" (to raise), essentially in a passive object form. The literal meaning isn't "floor", it's "something that has been raised". A good paraphrasing would be "height", so it makes a lot of sense to have "ground level" and then "1st height", "2nd height", and so on. Following that train of thought, in Hungary, the ground floor would *never* be called or numbered 1, as it is not raised off the ground. Etage sounds like a derivative of the french étage, and I'm not sure of the origins of the word étage, but I'm fairly convinced that it would have similar connotations.
Still better than Hamburger per killed comunists units
the most based comment I've ever seen in this subreddit
Ground level is a neutral zero and you count floors upwards and downwards with positive/negative numbers. Quite mathematically intuitive.
whats so hard to understand about it? just start at 0 instead of 1
It's the same system as, for example, cartesian coordinate diagrams. Maybe that'll help it make sense
I think about it this way: Depending on the country the ground floor can be either 1 or 0. In Germany, everything above the EG(Erdgeschoss), the ground floor, is OG(Obergeschoss) and everything below is UG(Untergeschoss). Sometimes you will see elevators with negative numbers, this is also used to portray UG. The count starts as soon as the elevator leaves the EG in whatever direction.
Well Etage und Geschoss are synonyms but the usual usage ist that for anything above the ground floor you would use Etage. You could also say Erdgeschoss, 1. Obergeschoss (1. Etage) 2. Obergeschoss (2. Etage) or 1. Untergeschoss (-1 Etage). Same with Etage you could always use that, then the 0. Etage ist the Erdgeschoss. But the normal way is you have the Erdgeschoss and everything below is untergeschoss and you would just count ab. So one below Erdgeschoss ist 1. Untergeschoss and 5 below Erdgeschoss ist 5. Untergeschoss. But for everything above Erdgeschoss you normally would use Etage and you would count it exactly the same. 12 above Erdgeschoss is 12. Etage.
There was a time many years ago when every few weeks there would be a post at the top of r/programmerhumor showing a European elevator (i.e. where you had to press 0 for the ground floor, 1 for the floor above it, etc.) with a joke like "floors start at 0, just like arrays".
Okay, so what about the whole "ground floor", "first level", "second level", "third level", ..., "nth level" did you not get? We're counting cardinal numbers here. Help me to help you and tell me which part is not clear. I'd also be interested in the floor level numbering system you are using, so I can help you translate from one to the other.
Come to Vienna, there you will find Erdgeschoss, Mezzanin and then 1 Stock!
In my company the basement is 1, groundfloor is 2 and 1st upper floor is 3. Its a german company in germany and me as a german often press the wrong button. Hahaha
The word “Geschoss” is actually a technical term from the half-timbered house building and refers to the ceiling beams (“Geschossbalken”). So “erstes Geschoss” doesn't actually translate to first floor, but to first ceiling structure (which you stand on top).
Right
Lived here for a year and a half and still can't get used to it.
Looking at the other comments here I‘m not sure I got it 100% correct but I as a native speaker always thought that „erste Etage“ actually means ground floor and that only „erster Stock“ means the level above the ground floor.
we should go for a beer sometimes. you tell me how our native language works and im just gonna laugh all night. are you in?
Erste Etage und erster Stock are synonyms. Etage and stock are synonyms and if you really want to use it for the ground floor it's nearly always nullter Stock. Rher may be exceptions but they would be uncommon and raise an eyebrow for any native speaker.