Farsi · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "سر" in Farsi?

"sar" — rhymes with a clipped version of English 'sat', but ending in a light tapped 'r' instead of 't'.

سر [sæɾ]

sar

One syllable; keep the vowel short and crisp, not drawn out like the English word 'car'.

Listen: سر

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

Sound it out

سَ 'sa' — English 's' plus the short flat 'a' of 'cat', not the long 'ah' of 'father'.

ر A light single tap of the tongue, like the 'r' in Spanish 'pero', not the English retroflex 'r'.

Hear it in a sentence

سرم درد می‌کند.

Saram dard mikonad.

My head hurts.

Listen: سرم درد می‌کند.

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

سرم درد می‌کند ("My head hurts") attaches the possessive suffix -am directly to سر (sar-am, "my head"), and درد می‌کند ("hurts," literally "makes pain") is the same light-verb pattern seen with طلوع می‌کند for the sun.

Where English speakers slip

Pronouncing it like the English word "sir" or drawing the vowel out into "sarr" is the classic mistake — Persian سر is short and clipped, with a quick tap for the ر, not a lingering English r.