Farsi · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "زیاد" in Farsi?

Say "zee-AHD," with the second half rhyming with "father" and the stress landing there.

زیاد /ziˈɒːd/

ziād

Stress falls on the final syllable, ād, which is a long open ā like the a in "father."

Listen: زیاد

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Sound it out

ز z, like the z in "zoo."

یا the ی and ا glide together into "yā": a quick i-sound sliding into a long, stressed ā (like father).

د d, like the d in "dog," closing the word.

Hear it in a sentence

او کتاب زیاد دارد.

U ketāb-e ziād dārad.

He/She has a lot of books.

Listen: او کتاب زیاد دارد.

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In "او کتاب زیاد دارد" (U ketāb-e ziād dārad), زیاد sits after the noun کتاب as a quantity word meaning "a lot of/many," so the sentence reads literally "he/she book many has." Note there's no ezafe (-e) linking ketāb and ziād here, unlike a true adjective; ziād functions more like a bare quantifier tacked on after the noun.

Where English speakers slip

English speakers want to put "a lot of" before the noun, but Persian زیاد comes after it — "کتاب زیاد," not "زیاد کتاب." Also don't confuse the long ā (father) with a short a; saying "zee-AD" with a flat American "a" sounds off to native ears.