LingoDrop
German · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "wo" in German?
VOH. The w is a v and the o is long and pure, with no glide off the end.
As a question word it opens the sentence and takes the first strong stress. German information questions fall in pitch rather than rising, so the word starts high and the sentence descends from there — the opposite of the English habit with some question types.
Listen: wo
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Hear it in a sentence
Wo wohnst du?
Where do you live?
Listen: Wo wohnst du?
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Wo wohnst du? puts two v sounds in a row, since both wo and wohnst begin with w. Wohnst has a silent h marking its long o, so the question contains two long o vowels with the same quality, which makes it an unusually clean drill for that sound.
Where English speakers slip
The English w is the reflex to break, and here it is doubly tempting because the German word looks like a stray fragment. It is 'voh'. The trio wo, wer and wie also needs sorting early — where, who and how differ only in their vowels, and blurring one turns a question into a different question entirely.