Chinese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "高" in Chinese?

Q: How do you pronounce 高 in Chinese?

高 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /kɑʊ˥/. It means “tall / high.” gao with no puff of air, held high and flat. The pitch height suits the meaning, which is a helpful mnemonic.

gao with no puff of air, held high and flat. The pitch height suits the meaning, which is a helpful mnemonic.

高 /kɑʊ˥/

gāo

No rule reaches this syllable. It is a stable neighbour too: any dipping tone in front of it keeps a full descent, and 不 before it stays as bù. In the very common hěn gāo, hěn therefore dips fully — a contrast worth drilling against hěn duǎn, where hěn rises instead.

Listen: 高

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Sound it out

g- Raise the back of the tongue to the soft palate, released with the breath held back. Neither the buzz of English g nor the gust of English k.

-ao A long glide from wide open "ah" toward a rounded finish. Its length gives the level tone a comfortable body to sit on.

gāo (level) Pinned at the top of the range and held without wavering. The mouth is moving through the glide while the pitch stays put, and separating those two is the small technical demand here.

Hear it in a sentence

我哥哥很高。

Wǒ gēge hěn gāo.

My brother is very tall.

Listen: 我哥哥很高。

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我哥哥很高。 keeps wǒ at a full dip before the level gē. Then gēge gives a high syllable plus a toneless echo, hěn sinks to the floor, and gāo leaps back to the top and holds. The sentence therefore ends on a sustained plateau rather than a movement, which is unusual and easy to under-produce.

Where English speakers slip

An audible puff on the g gives kāo. Keep the release silent. The level tone is the other issue: a long glide that closes toward "oo" naturally invites the pitch to fall away with it, so learners produce something closer to a fourth tone. Hold the pitch at the top through the entire glide and then stop cleanly.