How to Pronounce 'تعطیلات': Farsi Pronunciation Guide

Q: How do you pronounce تعطیلات in Farsi?

تعطیلات is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /tæʔtiːˈlɒːt/. It means “holiday.” Say "tuh," catch your breath briefly (like the pause in "uh-oh"), then "tee-LAHT," with the stress and the long open "ah" landing on the last syllable.

How do you pronounce "تعطیلات" in Farsi?

Say "tuh," catch your breath briefly (like the pause in "uh-oh"), then "tee-LAHT," with the stress and the long open "ah" landing on the last syllable.

تعطیلات /tæʔtiːˈlɒːt/

ta'tilāt

Stress falls on the final syllable, -لات ("-lāt"), which holds the long ā vowel, while the ع right after the first syllable marks a genuine glottal-stop break that shouldn't be smoothed away.

Listen: تعطیلات

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Sound it out

تـ A plain "t" plus a short "a," like the start of "tuck" — unstressed.

ع A glottal stop, the same throat-catch as in بعضی and ساعت — a brief, clean pause rather than a smooth glide into the next syllable.

طی "Ti," a plain "t" plus a long "ee" — note ط is pronounced just like a regular ت in modern Persian, despite the different shape.

لات "Lāt," a clear "l" plus a long, open "ā" as in "father" plus a final "t" — this carries the main stress.

Hear it in a sentence

تعطیلات تابستان طولانی است.

Ta'tilāt-e tābestān tulāni ast.

Summer holiday is long.

Listen: تعطیلات تابستان طولانی است.

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In تعطیلات تابستان طولانی است, تعطیلات تابستان means "summer holiday/vacation," pairing تعطیلات with تابستان ("summer") in a noun-noun sequence similar to an ezafe construction, though often left unmarked in casual writing. طولانی ("long") describes the holiday, and است ("is") closes the sentence, giving the straightforward structure "Summer holiday is long."

Where English speakers slip

Because تعطیلات is plural in form (it comes from an Arabic broken-plural pattern) but is generally treated as a single concept in Persian ("the holidays/vacation" as one idea), English speakers sometimes try to use it with singular agreement patterns borrowed from English "a holiday" — but Persian speakers use تعطیلات on its own, without an article, to mean the holiday period as a whole, much like English "vacation" used generically.