"Du kommer att tappa tallriken!"

Translation: You are going to drop the plate!

[legresam]

How do we know here if it's going to be 'drop' or 'lose'?

[Zmrzlina]

Tappa often has to do with physically dropping something.

[OllePatriksson]

'Tappa' means 'to drop'
'Tappa bort' means 'to lose (A thing)'

[Xango222]

What?? I seem to remember several sentences where tappar meant losing.

[MarvelMani1]

tappar can mean 'drops' as in 'it fell out of her hands' or 'loses', you can't be sure.
If you add bort and say tappar bort instead, it will be unambiguous (and mean like 'misplaces').

per Arnauti in https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/7412910

[MihailDimitrov]

Hello, would you consider "I am about to" an alternative acceptable version to "I am going to" in this situation?

[RMB229]

All right, but "lose" is given as an option.

[Arnauti]

If you lose your umbrella for instance, that would be tappa. But you're not likely to 'lose' a plate in that sense. Hints are just hints, not all hints work everywhere.

[TiraBr0]

I love the 'kommer att'. Reminds me of a Southern USA way of speaking of the future. As in: I'm thinking of fixing to get ready to make dinner. Wonder how that would work in Swedish?

[HansLovesIce]

I guessed "you might drop the plate" could be a good translation here.
Is it wrong that I was marked wrong or was my translation not good enough?

[Zmrzlina]

It was not a good translation. For expressing "might" like that, it's common in Swedish to use "kan", "kan komma att" or "skulle kunna".

[HansLovesIce]

Tack, jag skulle kunna lära det ;-)

[TheSeez]

Störd är i huset, vi tappar tallrikarna!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpL2sWLwEtU

[DaManpede]

So is the primary meaning of 'tappa' to physically drop something? The fact that it can function as losing something is more or less incidental?