Hindi · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "हवाई अड्डा" in Hindi?

Q: How do you pronounce हवाई अड्डा in Hindi?

हवाई अड्डा is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ɦə.ʋaː.iː əɖ.ɖaː/. It means “airport.” huh-VAA-ee uḌ-ḍaa — a vowel hiatus in the first word and a doubled retroflex d in the second.

huh-VAA-ee uḌ-ḍaa — a vowel hiatus in the first word and a doubled retroflex d in the second.

हवाई अड्डा /ɦə.ʋaː.iː əɖ.ɖaː/

havaaee aḍḍaa

Five syllables in all, and the phrase has two very different kinds of length in it: a vowel hiatus in the first word and a held consonant in the second. Both stretch the phrase without adding stress anywhere.

Listen: हवाई अड्डा

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Sound it out

havaa A voiced ह, a bare schwa, the loose Hindi व with little friction, and a long open आ.

ee A long ई follows that aa with no consonant between them — a real hiatus, which is why the word has three syllables.

ḍḍ A geminate retroflex stop: curl the tongue tip up and back and hold the closure for about twice the normal duration before releasing.

aa The long आ that follows the release, marking the masculine ending.

Hear it in a sentence

मुझे हवाई अड्डे जाना है।

Mujhe havaaee aḍḍe jaanaa hai.

I have to go to the airport.

Listen: मुझे हवाई अड्डे जाना है।

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

"Mujhe havaaee aḍḍe jaanaa hai" puts the noun into the oblique aḍḍe before the destination reading, so the final vowel changes while the geminate stays intact. Mujhe's breathy झ opens the sentence.

Where English speakers slip

Three things slip: the hiatus collapses into a diphthong, the retroflex stops become alveolar, and the gemination shortens to a single consonant. Take them in order — two separate vowels, tongue curled back, and a closure held noticeably long.