How to Pronounce 'Amare': Italian Pronunciation Guide

Q: How do you pronounce amare in Italian?

amare is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /aˈma.re/. It means “to love.” ah-MAH-reh , stress in the middle, rhyming with "bra" or "spa." In IPA: /aˈma.re/ . Both a's stay open and identical in quality, only the second one is held longer.

How do you pronounce "amare" in Italian?

ah-MAH-reh, stress in the middle, rhyming with "bra" or "spa." In IPA: /aˈma.re/. Both a's stay open and identical in quality, only the second one is held longer.

amare /aˈma.re/

Written as three syllables, a, ma, and re, each one fully voiced. In "Ti amo," resist blending "ti" into "amo" the way French elides "je" and "aime" into "j'aime" — Italian keeps the two words fully separate, each vowel intact.

Listen: amare

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

Sound it out

The spelling is entirely regular, the more useful thing to notice is what does not happen between words: unlike French, Italian doesn't elide or contract vowels across a word boundary here, so "Ti amo" stays two clearly separate words, not one blended sound.

a An unstressed but full open "ah," the first of two identical vowel qualities in this word.

ma The stressed syllable, the same open "ah" as before, just held a little longer and hit a bit harder.

re A short, closed "reh" to finish.

Hear it in a sentence

Ti amo.

I love you.

Listen: Ti amo.

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

"Ti amo" is a serious, emotionally weighty phrase in Italian, reserved for romantic love or very deep affection — it's not thrown around casually the way "I love you" sometimes is in English. Saying it too early or too lightly in a relationship can come across as more intense than intended.

For family, close friends, or lighter affection, Italians typically say "ti voglio bene" instead, literally "I want good for you." Learning to keep "amare" and "voler bene" apart is one of the more important nuance points in Italian, since English collapses both into a single verb, "love."

Where English speakers slip

Because "amare" resembles English "amorous" or "amiable," some learners misplace the stress toward the front, saying "AH-ma-re." Italian stresses the second syllable, "a-MA-re," the regular pattern for "-are" verbs.

The other tendency, especially for anyone who's studied French, is to blend "Ti amo" into a single slurred sound, the way French contracts "je t'aime." In Italian, "ti" keeps its own full, separate syllable — there's no elision between the two words.