French · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "beau" in French?

Q: How do you pronounce beau in French?

beau is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /bo/. It means “beautiful / good-looking (f. belle).” boh — two sounds. The "eau" spelling is a single pure "oh", nothing more.

boh — two sounds. The "eau" spelling is a single pure "oh", nothing more.

beau /bo/

One syllable. The adjective has three forms worth knowing as a set: "beau" before a consonant, "bel" before a vowel (bel homme), and "belle" in the feminine — three different sounds for the same idea.

Listen: beau

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Sound it out

b A normal "b".

eau Three letters, one sound: a closed "oh". This spelling is always /o/, and it never adds a glide toward "oo" the way English "go" does.

Hear it in a sentence

Paris est une très belle ville.

Paris is a very beautiful city.

Listen: Paris est une très belle ville.

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"Paris est une très belle ville" uses the feminine "belle" /bɛl/, which sounds nothing like "beau": the vowel is an open "eh" and there is a real "l". Note also that "belle" comes before the noun — French usually puts adjectives after, but a short cluster of common ones (beau, bon, grand, petit) goes in front. "Très" makes a liaison here only before a vowel, so not with "belle".

Where English speakers slip

The "eau" spelling causes people to attempt several vowels at once, producing "bee-oh" or "bay-oo". It is one clean "oh". The bigger trap is the form-switching: learners say "un beau homme" when French requires "un bel homme", purely for ease of pronunciation. And they carry "boh" into the feminine, saying "boh femme" instead of "belle femme".