Definitive Guide To Acing German Pronunciation
Definitive Guide To Acing German Pronunciation
Definitive Guide To Acing German Pronunciation
1. Consonants
Note: German consonants B, F, G, K, L, M, N, P, T and X sound exactly the same as their English
counterparts, hence those are not included here to keep this guide compact.
d, at the start / middle of d in day dunkel (dark), Ding (thing), laden (load)
a word
Freund (friend)
Pronounced, when it begins a word Herz (heart), Hals (neck), heute (today)
Silent, when it is preceded by a sehen (to see), sehr (very), fahren (to
vowel (this is used to indicate that drive/ go), wohnen (to live), Ruhe
the vowel is long) (silence)
It is also used when the ‘r’ is the Tür (door), Uhr (clock), mehr (more), vier
last letter in a word, and follows (four), Bier (beer), Chor (chorus)
after a long vowel.
Click here to listen
r, Vocalic
Also used when the 'r' follows a Pferd (horse), Herd (cooker), spürte (felt),
(pronounced as a ‘vowel’, long vowel but precedes another führte (led)
not as a consonant) consonant.
Click here to listen
Used with prefixes er-, ver-, zer- erlauben (to allow) , vergessen (to
and her- forget), zerstören (to destroy),
hereinkommen (to come in)
YouTube lesson
s in sea
pf ‘p’ and ‘f’ are sounded together Pferd (horse), Kopf (head)
-ig suffix sounds exactly like ch in case (ii) richtig (correct), Honig (honey), lustig
above (funny), traurig (sad), eilig
(hurried), fertig (finished)
Listen
Listen
3. Vowels
long: a in say Lesen (to read), gehen (to go), leben (to