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German · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "die Idee" in German?
dee ee-DAY. The stress is on the second syllable and the ee at the end is a long 'ay'.
The beat lands at the back, following the word's Greek-via-French origin. The plural Ideen adds a third syllable and keeps the stress in the same place, giving ee-DAY-en — three beats with the weight in the middle, which is unusual enough in German to be worth rehearsing.
Listen: die Idee
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Hear it in a sentence
Das ist eine gute Idee!
That's a good idea!
Listen: Das ist eine gute Idee!
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Das ist eine gute Idee! gives the adjective the -e ending for a feminine nominative noun. There is a small glottal catch between eine and gute and again before Idee, so the exclamation contains several of those tiny hard onsets in quick succession.
Where English speakers slip
English idea has the beat on the middle syllable and finishes on a schwa; German has the beat on the last syllable and finishes on a long 'ay'. Learners also read the ee as 'ee', producing 'ee-DEE'. Say 'ee' then 'DAY', with the second syllable clearly the louder one.