German · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "zehn" in German?

TSAIN. Start with the 'ts' of cats, then a long 'ay' — the h is silent and only marks that vowel as long.

zehn /tseːn/

One syllable with a long vowel, giving it more duration than acht or fünf. It keeps its stress in zehn Uhr and zehn Minuten; only in a compound such as zehntausend does it share the weight with the larger number that follows.

Listen: zehn

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Sound it out

z 'ts', as in every German word.

eh Long 'ay' as in the first part of English hey, but held steady without sliding toward 'ee'. The h is a length sign and is never pronounced.

n A clean n to finish, fully released with nothing after it.

Hear it in a sentence

Warte zehn Minuten.

Wait ten minutes.

Listen: Warte zehn Minuten.

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Warte zehn Minuten is an imperative, and the du form of warten drops the -st to leave just warte with a schwa on the end. Minuten takes its stress in the middle, mi-NU-ten, because borrowed Latin nouns escape the usual first-syllable rule.

Where English speakers slip

The z sends English speakers straight to 'zen', a real English word and doubly tempting for it. German z is 'ts', full stop. Then the vowel needs guarding: English 'ay' finishes on a y-glide, while German holds the long e flat and unmoving, closer to a sustained version of the vowel in the Scottish pronunciation of gate.