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German · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "ihn" in German?

EEN, one long vowel and an n. The h is silent — it exists purely to tell you the i is long.

ihn /iːn/

Only one syllable to work with, and as an object pronoun it normally rides unstressed inside its clause. It takes the beat only for contrast — Ich sehe IHN, not her — at which point the long vowel stretches further to carry the emphasis.

Listen: ihn

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Sound it out

ih A long 'ee'. German uses a silent h after a vowel as a length marker, the same device at work in Bahn, sehen and ihm. Never pronounce it.
n A clean n closing the syllable.

Hear it in a sentence

Ich sehe ihn morgen.

I'll see him tomorrow.

Listen: Ich sehe ihn morgen.

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

Ich sehe ihn morgen uses the accusative form because ihn is the direct object of sehe. The time expression morgen comes after the object, and German present tense covers the future with no extra machinery, so 'I see him tomorrow' is simply how you say 'I'll see him tomorrow'.

Where English speakers slip

On the page, ihn looks like English in, and that is exactly what beginners say — a short, lax vowel. German ihn is long and tense, closer to the vowel of seen. This one is worth drilling, because German also has a word in with the short vowel, making the two a genuine minimal pair: mis-time the vowel and 'I see him' turns into a stray preposition.