Dutch · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "sorry" in Dutch?

Q: How do you pronounce sorry in Dutch?

sorry is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈsɔri/. It means “sorry / excuse me.” SO-ree, with a short open o and a clear final "ee" — not the English "SAH-ree."

SO-ree, with a short open o and a clear final "ee" — not the English "SAH-ree."

sorry /ˈsɔri/

Two syllables with the beat firmly on the first, SOR-ry, which matches English and makes this one of the rare loanwords you can stress by instinct. What changes is the vowel quality inside that stressed syllable, not its position.

Listen: sorry

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Sound it out

s A plain hissing s, identical to English, and one of the few Dutch consonants that needs no adjustment at all.

o The short rounded o of British "sorry" rather than the unrounded American "ah." Round the lips slightly and keep the vowel brief.

rr One r sound, doubled in spelling only to keep the o short. Most Dutch speakers make it a light tap or a soft uvular scrape, never the English curled r.

y Word-final y here works like Dutch ie: a bright, tense "ee." Dutch borrowed the spelling but applied its own vowel.

Hear it in a sentence

Sorry, ik hoorde je niet.

Sorry, I didn't hear you.

Listen: Sorry, ik hoorde je niet.

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"Sorry, ik hoorde je niet" uses the past tense "hoorde" from "horen," with the long "oo" audible before the -de ending. Notice that "niet" comes at the end — Dutch pushes the negator to the back of the clause, so the apology and the reason land in the opposite order from English "I didn't hear you."

Where English speakers slip

Anglophones reach for their own "sorry" unchanged, which imports two problems at once: the unrounded American "AH" vowel and the heavy retroflex r that colours the vowel before it. Dutch keeps the o rounded and short, and the r light enough that the vowel stays pure. The final "-y" also comes out as a lazy English "-ee-uh" glide when it should be a single tense vowel.