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In the US we use the word "home" to indicate the main page on a website. This might be exclusive to the English language because I know in Spanish we do not use "casa" which would be the equivalent of "home." I verified that on this Mercedes dealer page in Mexico

Mexico Mercedes

I then looked at the Mercedes Dealership in Frankfurt and did not even see an obvious "home" equivalent but the logo gives the default action of taking you to the main page.

Frankfurt Mercedes

However the Volkswagen in Frankfurt did have "Home" actually written, but it seemed out of place.

Frankfurt mercedes

I am aware of a few words that mean "home" in German. So far I was considering 

Zuhause

But I have not seen that anywhere. So I am wondering if it might be best to use a different word, or perhaps a phrase equivalent to "main page."

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    Zuhause in this context just sounds awkward.
    – René Nyffenegger
    Feb 26, 2014 at 10:41
  • I'd translate "home" as "hogar" in Spanish. Not that it changes anything, since that's not used either, but I thought I'd point it out.
    – clinch
    Mar 4, 2014 at 22:33

3 Answers 3

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Home is commonly used even on german websites.

I guess Startseite is the (or one of the) most common german counterpart(s).

Note that Startseite also is used for the page the browser shows up first, when being launched.

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    But my guess is that "Startseite" is not common on German websites, correct? and in this context it seems you suggest just using "home"?
    – JGallardo
    Feb 25, 2014 at 19:15
  • @JGallardo I think Home is more common and is perfectly understood by the vast majority of web users (if not all). Sites being somewhat official, rather have Startseite, e. g. this one.
    – user5513
    Feb 25, 2014 at 19:23
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On German websites you’ll often find "Start" (or "Startseite") and "Home".

I don’t think that there is a clear winner which term is used most (well, there are so many websites).

I wanted to list some examples and the first four sites I checked all used a different label:

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None of the literal german translations of home (zu Hause, daheim, Heimat) applies to a web page. Probably that's why VW uses the english word "Home"; because there's no german word that really fits, and "Homepage" is commonly used among the computer-literate.

If you really want to use a german word, i'd recommend Startseite or maybe Einstiegsseite. The direct equivalent of main page, Hauptseite, would be understandable to germans, but feel a bit strange to me.

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  • Thanks for the feedback, no I was not necessarily needing to use a German word, just the most commonly recognized equivalent.
    – JGallardo
    Feb 25, 2014 at 19:14
  • Another rarely used term is Leitseite.
    – nwellnhof
    Feb 26, 2014 at 12:21

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