Dutch · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "de zus" in Dutch?

duh ZUHS — the u is short and rounded, and the initial z is barely voiced.

de zus /də ˈzʏs/

One very short beat — a three-sound word with a short vowel at its centre. The plural "zussen" doubles the s in spelling to protect that shortness, then adds a schwa, so the vowel is unchanged and the word simply grows a tail.

Listen: de zus

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

Sound it out

z Given very little voicing at the start, so it sits close to the s that ends the word — the two consonants nearly match.

u Purse the lips over a central tongue and keep it short. Unrounded, it becomes an English non-word.

s A clean voiceless hiss closing the word, never taking on a z-like buzz.

Hear it in a sentence

Ik heb een oudere zus.

I have an older sister.

Listen: Ik heb een oudere zus.

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

"Ik heb een oudere zus" uses the comparative with its -e ending, so "oudere" has three syllables and two of them are weak. The sentence therefore builds through a long unstressed stretch before the short, sharp noun at the end.

Where English speakers slip

Everything hinges on rounding the u, exactly as in "dus" and "druk." Without it you land on an English non-word. Purse the lips slightly and keep the vowel short. Learners also give the initial z a full buzz, which makes the two ends of the word sound mismatched.