Chinese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "听" in Chinese?

Q: How do you pronounce 听 in Chinese?

听 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /tʰiŋ˥/. It means “to listen / to hear.” ting with a strong puff of air, high and flat. The ending is the back nasal of "sing", not a front n.

ting with a strong puff of air, high and flat. The ending is the back nasal of "sing", not a front n.

听 /tʰiŋ˥/

tīng

Fixed high, in every context. It appears constantly in verb-complement structures, and there the tone of the following material matters more than its own: in tīng bu jiàn, the negator between the two verbs is toneless, so the phrase runs high, nothing, falling.

Listen: 听

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

Sound it out

t- Aspirated: the tongue tip leaves the ridge and a real gust of breath follows before the vowel. Mandarin aspirates harder than English does, so exaggerate slightly.

-ing A tense "ee" closed at the back of the mouth by ng. Many speakers insert a faint schwa between the vowel and the nasal, which is normal and helps the transition.

tīng (level) Pinned high for the whole syllable including the nasal. Nasal endings invite the pitch to fall away; hold it steady and stop cleanly.

Hear it in a sentence

我听不见。

Wǒ tīng bu jiàn.

I can't hear you.

Listen: 我听不见。

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

我听不见。 is exactly that structure. Wǒ dips, tīng holds high, bu is completely toneless because it sits inside a potential complement, and jiàn falls. Note that this is neither bù nor bú — the sandhi rules do not apply because there is no tone left to change. Four syllables and only three of them carry pitch.

Where English speakers slip

Two errors. Under-aspirating gives dīng, a different word, and English speakers reduce aspiration on unstressed verbs habitually. Second, the nasal drifts forward to tīn, which is not a Mandarin syllable at all but sounds acceptable to an English ear. Feel for the back of your tongue rising to close the sound while the tip stays down.