German · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "das Auto" in German?

Q: How do you pronounce das Auto in German?

das Auto is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /das ˈaʊ̯.to/. It means “car (pl. Autos).” dass OW-toh. A glottal catch, the au as the 'ow' of house, and a rounded o at the end.

dass OW-toh. A glottal catch, the au as the 'ow' of house, and a rounded o at the end.

das Auto /das ˈaʊ̯.to/

Front-stressed, and the plural Autos takes an -s ending, which is unusual for German and marks the word as a borrowing. The stress stays on the diphthong throughout, and compounds like Autobahn keep the primary beat there while adding a secondary one on the second element.

Listen: das Auto

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Sound it out

Au The 'ow' diphthong of house, preceded by a light glottal stop since the word begins on a vowel.

t An aspirated t, released firmly.

o A rounded, fairly closed o. Unstressed, but it keeps a real vowel rather than reducing to a schwa.

Hear it in a sentence

Mein Auto ist kaputt.

My car is broken.

Listen: Mein Auto ist kaputt.

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Mein Auto ist kaputt ends on kaputt, which stresses its second syllable and keeps its u short thanks to the doubled t. So the sentence has a front-stressed noun and a back-stressed adjective in the same short span, which is worth noticing as a rhythm exercise.

Where English speakers slip

English auto has an 'aw' vowel, and that is what learners import. German au is 'ow', so the word begins like the English word out. The unstressed o at the end is the second detail: English would reduce it to a schwa, but German keeps it a real rounded vowel, giving 'OW-toh' rather than 'OW-tuh'.