This is the 395th most frequent German word.
länder
"Länder" (plural of "Land") means "states" or "regions" in Germany, referring to the federal states.
Here, 'Länder' refers to countries, used as the plural of 'Land' meaning a nation-state.
Deutschland und Frankreich sind beides europäische Länder.
Germany and France are both European countries.
Here, 'Ländern' (dative plural of 'Länder') refers to countries, showing its grammatical case usage depending on its role in the sentence.
Die Kulturen in diesen Ländern unterscheiden sich stark.
The cultures in these countries differ greatly.
In this context, 'Länder' is part of 'Bundesländer', referring to the federal states within Germany's government structure.