From buying new hard drives to cleaning out garages, humans are often preoccupied with storing information as well as objects and materials. 

The verb etwas lagern essentially means "to store something." We use it to talk about putting physical objects in an external location for a longer period of time. 

Aber keine Sorge, so lang haben die Kisten ja nicht gelagert.

But don't worry, the boxes haven't been stored here that long.

Caption 48, Die Pfefferkörner: Endspurt

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Können sie jetzt Spreewaldgurken drin lagern.

Now they can store Spreewald pickles in there.

Caption 47, heute-show 30 Jahre Mauerfall: So feiern die Deutschen ihre Einheit

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We always use the verb speichern when we talk about saving files, websites, emails, and other digital items: 

Verwendet also das Lesezeichen-Menü, wenn ihr ein Video zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt sehen möchtet oder einfach euren ganzen Lieblingscontent speichern wollt.

So use the bookmark menu if you'd like to watch a video at a later time or just want to save all your favorite content.

Captions 31-33, Yabla-Anleitung: Lieblingsvideos markieren

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Mailbox... speichern.

Mailbox... save.

Caption 4, Nicos Weg: Reklamation

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At the same time, speichern is often used to describe the storage of substances within a particular body, like CO₂ and water in plants:

In den tropischen Regenwäldern am Amazonas ist zum Beispiel so viel CO-zwei gespeichert, wie wir weltweit innerhalb von fünfzehn Jahren freisetzen.

In the tropical rainforests along the Amazon River, for example, as much CO-two is stored as we release worldwide within fifteen years.

Captions 16-17, OroVerde: Regenwald schützen CO₂, Regenwald und Klimaschutz

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Das Vierzigfache ihres Eigengewichts können sie aufnehmen und speichern.

They can absorb and store forty times their own weight.

Caption 16, Wunderkräfte aus der Windel: Wasserspeicher für Blumenerde

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Two related nouns to know are der Vorrat and der Speicher:

Der fertige Honig dient der aktuellen Ernährung des Bienenvolkes, der Aufzucht der Brut und als Vorrat für den Winter.

The finished honey is used as day-to-day nutrition for the bee colony, for raising the brood, and as a supply for the winter.

Captions 31-32, Für Tierfreunde Aktion Tier: Die Honigbiene

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Die Alpenseen sind nicht die einzigen großen Wasserspeicher in den Bergen.

The alpine lakes are not the only large water reservoirs in the mountains.

Caption 29, Alpenseen: Kühle Schönheiten

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Another important verb is verstauen which means to stow something or put it away. If you fly to or within Germany, you will most certainly hear this, as it is often used when referring to carry-on luggage.

Further Learning
Search for speichern and lagern on Yabla German to see more examples of these verbs in use.

I've had native German-speaking colleagues tell me that I speak German with a very good accent. So it came as a shock to me a couple of years ago when a British friend (who had studied at a German university and whose accent is excellent) said to me: "You just said danke schon back there. It's danke schön!" I realized that I'd somehow slid from the uniquely German sound of the umlaut Ö into a standard O. I spent the next couple of months working to consciously improve my umlaut pronunciation awareness.

When you are first learning a foreign language, you will likely encounter letters and letter combinations that are unlike anything in your native language. We all know that it takes a while to learn to pronounce them, getting your mouth's muscle memory used to making completely new movements to get that sound to come out right.

But what we may be a bit less conscious of is the fact that it is also difficult to hear the sounds of some letters and letter combinations in a new non-native language. A native English speaker may, hearing German for the first time, try to mimic danke schön as "donkey shown." This is not only due to its difficult pronunciation. To some extent, a beginner may even hear it the way they mispronounced it.

You'll likely be familiar with the adjective schön, which is usually translated as "nice," "beautiful," or "pretty."

Die beiden sind doch ein richtig schönes Paar.

The two of them make a really nice couple.

Caption 83, Die Pfefferkörner - Endspurt

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Es war einmal eine schöne, junge Frau namens Jorinde.

There was once a beautiful young woman named Jorinde.

Caption 5, Märchen - Sagenhaft - Jorinde und Joringel

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The adverb schön, however, is rarely translated the same as the adjective. In the case of danke schön, it is usually translated as "thank you" or "thank you very much." The "very much" addresses the adverb schön, since with only danke then "thank you" or "thanks" is enough. The key to the adverb schön, however, is that it strengthens whatever it is modifying.

Hast es dir schön gemütlich gemacht hier.

You've made yourself nice and comfortable here.

Caption 30, Lerchenberg - Viva La Television!

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Ich liebe die Atmosphäre bei mir zu Hause,

I love the atmosphere in my home,

besonders, wenn alles schön sauber gemacht worden ist.

especially when everything has been made nice and clean.

Captions 1-2, Deutsch mit Eylin - Putzen

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In the two captions above, schön was translated as "nice" with the additional conjunction "and" so that it correlates with the standard English construction "nice and..." The above could have been translated, albeit it less gracefully, as "nicely comfortable" or "nicely clean." The above two captions are also perfect examples where somebody starting to learn German may misinterpret schön as schon, which would have a different meaning:

Du hast es dir schon gemütlich gemacht hier.
You've already made yourself comfortable here.

Ich liebe die Atmosphäre bei mir zu Hause, besonders, wenn alles schon sauber gemacht worden ist.
I love the atmosphere at my house, especially when everything has already been made clean.

Note that some of the German above is not quite grammatically correct, but it's written as a misheard statement. In the first one, the person who misheard might reply "Yes, of course I'm already comfortable, should I not be?" In the second, someone might reply "Oh, do you have a housekeeper who cleans for you in advance?" Mild misunderstandings to be sure, but misunderstandings nonetheless. Just imagine the confusion when this poor soul hears the following:

So, jetzt weißt du schon ganz schön viel

So now you already know quite a lot

über mich und meine Familie.

about me and my family.

Captions 51-52, Deutsch mit Eylin - Die Familie

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Or better yet:

Ist schon schön, ne?

It is nice, isn't it?

Caption 44, Angelique Kerber - Ihre tennisfreie Zeit

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Say that twenty times fast as a tongue-twister, or as the case may be, an umlaut twister! Note that schon isn't translated. That is because although it is technically an adverb, it's really more of a "filler word" or modal particle.

Further Learning
Go to Yabla German and search for schön being used as an adverb, which is any use of schön that does not appear before a noun. See all of the different ways that it can be translated according to the different contexts, including into the English adverb "pretty." But more about the strange relationship of schön and "pretty" in an upcoming lesson!