English versions are usually shorter.

The English text is usually shorter if its is a continuous text.
Though when translating things like subject indexes, keyword listings and such, the English tends to be longer, as German has a tendency to use nouns for nearly everything, which at times just cannot be done in English.

I asked about this ages ago, but can't find the thread any more. I think the general consensus was that they are shorter in English, but it depends on the text (subject, style) and your style of writing. I usually find my translations are only about 5-10% shorter than the German original.

Another thing that makes the English longer is when you have names of institutions, laws etc. where you need to provide a translation but also keep the German original in the text.

In general shorter, though not by much, and it depends on the use of those wonderful German nouns that require a rather longer "Umschreibung" in English. A lot of things like "Berlinerin = the (young) woman from Berlin" can add length to the final product.

agree...most of time shorter, but it varies. I recently had an IT text where every English paragraph was shorter than the German, causing more blank space between text and images throughout the brochure. Of course this can be compensated for with a little DTP magic - but that's not (usually) our job.

I think it may also depend on whether you calculate your cost by line or word.
Haven't done German in a while, but seems to me EN was always longer (word count), because we don't use those Zusammensetzungen that Selkie refers to in # 4.

That's a good point RES: I calculate by the line.

Actually, by word count, I find the EN text is often 10-15% longer (and try to charge accordingly if it is a direct client and they base payment on the source text - target text payment = no problemo) :)