Dutch · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "achter" in Dutch?

Q: How do you pronounce achter in Dutch?

achter is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈɑxtər/. It means “behind.” AHKH-tur — open "ah," then the harsh ch, and a weak second syllable.

AHKH-tur — open "ah," then the harsh ch, and a weak second syllable.

achter /ˈɑxtər/

Weight on the front, with the second syllable reduced to almost nothing. Worth noting: as a separable verb prefix — "achterlaten," to leave behind — this word keeps its stress, which is why the prefix wins the beat over the verb it attaches to.

Listen: achter

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Sound it out

a Open and back, cut off almost immediately by the fricative behind it.

cht The rasp and the t belong to the same syllable, with nothing between them. English speakers reach for a k here, which seals the airflow instead of scraping it.

er A weak closing syllable: schwa plus a very light r, often barely more than a breath in casual speech.

Hear it in a sentence

De tuin is achter het huis.

The garden is behind the house.

Listen: De tuin is achter het huis.

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"De tuin is achter het huis" uses the preposition with a location, and "tuin" beforehand contains the difficult ui diphthong while "huis" contains it again at the end. So the sentence bookends the preposition with two of Dutch's hardest vowels.

Where English speakers slip

The cht cluster gets flattened to a k, giving "AK-ter," which is the standard substitution. Keep the air scraping. The -er ending then picks up an American r, inflating a syllable that should barely register. German speakers have an advantage on the fricative but tend to make it too far forward — Dutch ch sits further back.