Chinese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "床" in Chinese?

Q: How do you pronounce 床 in Chinese?

床 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ʈʂʰwɑŋ˧˥/. It means “bed.” chwahng with the tongue curled back and a strong puff of air, climbing from mid to high. Rounded glide, wide open vowel, back nasal.

chwahng with the tongue curled back and a strong puff of air, climbing from mid to high. Rounded glide, wide open vowel, back nasal.

床 /ʈʂʰwɑŋ˧˥/

chuáng

Nothing bends this climb. The word shares its segments exactly with the second syllable of 起床, which is convenient — learn the syllable once and it serves both. Its rising tone also means any dipping syllable in front of it keeps a full descent.

Listen: 床

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Sound it out

ch- The curled tip gives a hollow release with a genuine gust of breath behind it.

-uang A rounded w-glide opening into a broad "ah", sealed at the back of the mouth by ng. Three stages, and the "ah" should be the longest of them.

chuáng (rising) The tone lifts from mid to high across all that movement, finishing on the nasal. The syllable is busy, so the climb needs to be deliberate or it disappears.

Hear it in a sentence

我要早点上床睡觉。

Wǒ yào zǎodiǎn shàng chuáng shuìjiào.

I'm going to bed early.

Listen: 我要早点上床睡觉。

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我要早点上床睡觉。 has a conversion in the middle: zǎo and diǎn are adjacent dipping tones, so zǎo rises. Then shàng plunges, chuáng climbs, and shuìjiào gives two more falls. Wǒ at the start keeps its dip because yào falls. Three drops and two climbs in one seven-syllable sentence.

Where English speakers slip

Under-aspirating gives zhuáng. Push the air out audibly. The rounded glide is often dropped so the syllable becomes "chahng", and the back nasal drifts forward to chuán, which is a real word meaning boat. Three errors, and any one of them makes the sentence about furniture harder to follow.