German · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "anrufen" in German?

Q: How do you pronounce anrufen in German?

anrufen is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈanˌʁuː.fn̩/. It means “to call (on the phone).” AN-roo-fn. The prefix an takes the stress, the r is throaty, and the u is long.

AN-roo-fn. The prefix an takes the stress, the r is throaty, and the u is long.

anrufen /ˈanˌʁuː.fn̩/

Weight on the prefix, which marks the verb as separable. Notice how different this is from an inseparable verb such as verstehen, where the prefix is unstressed and the root takes the beat — the stress pattern alone tells you whether a German verb will break apart in a sentence.

Listen: anrufen

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Sound it out

an A short open a with a light glottal catch in front. As a separable prefix it carries the main stress.

r The uvular r as a real consonant, since a vowel follows it — a light scrape at the back of the mouth.

u Long 'oo', firmly rounded.

fen An f released into a syllabic n.

Hear it in a sentence

Ich rufe dich später an.

I'll call you later.

Listen: Ich rufe dich später an.

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Ich rufe dich später an detaches the prefix and parks it at the end, after the time word. Später is worth a moment on its own: the sp at the start of the word is pronounced 'shp', and the ä is long, so it comes out 'SHPAY-tuh' with the usual softened -er ending.

Where English speakers slip

Two things trip people up, and neither is the r. Learners stress the root, saying an-RU-fen, when German puts the beat on an. And they leave the verb whole in the sentence, which is ungrammatical: the prefix has to travel to the end. Once you hear that the loud syllable is the prefix, the splitting rule starts to feel less arbitrary.