Chinese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "天气" in Chinese?

Q: How do you pronounce 天气 in Chinese?

天气 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /tʰjɛn˥.tɕʰi˥˩/. It means “weather.” tyen-CHEE: a high level first syllable with a strong puff of air, then a hard-falling second with another one.

tyen-CHEE: a high level first syllable with a strong puff of air, then a hard-falling second with another one.

天气 /tʰjɛn˥.tɕʰi˥˩/

tiānqì

Level into falling, with no sandhi. Both initials are aspirated, so this is a word with a lot of breath in it — unusual, since most two-syllable compounds mix an aspirated consonant with an unaspirated one. Producing both puffs without letting either one weaken is the technical demand.

Listen: 天气

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Sound it out

tiān The tongue tip leaves the ridge with a real gust of breath, into a quick "ee" glide, a tight "eh", and a front n. Held at the top of the range.

qì Now the blade of the tongue spreads against the hard palate and releases with another strong puff, onto a tense "ee". The pitch plunges from the plateau to the floor.

Hear it in a sentence

今天天气怎么样？

Jīntiān tiānqì zěnmeyàng?

What's the weather like today?

Listen: 今天天气怎么样？

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今天天气怎么样？ repeats tiān twice in a row — the end of 今天 and the start of 天气 — so you get two identical level syllables back to back before qì drops. Then zěn dips, me fades, yàng plunges. Sustaining that double tiān at the same height, without letting the second sag, is the sentence's main difficulty.

Where English speakers slip

Under-aspirating either syllable is the standard error: tiān becomes diān and qì becomes jì. Feel the air on your palm for both. The -ian final also opens out to "tyahn", and the q gets produced as an English "ch" with rounded lips and a retracted tongue when it should be forward with the lips spread.