Italian · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "cento" in Italian?

Q: How do you pronounce cento in Italian?

cento is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈtʃɛnto/. It means “hundred.” CHEN-toh , stress on the first syllable, rhyming with "when." In IPA: /ˈtʃɛnto/ .

CHEN-toh, stress on the first syllable, rhyming with "when." In IPA: /ˈtʃɛnto/.

cento /ˈtʃɛnto/

Two syllables, cen and to, weight solidly on the first: CHEN-toh, never cen-TOH.

Listen: cento

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

Sound it out

The opening c is the whole story here: before e or i, Italian c is always soft, giving the "ch" of "cheese" rather than the hard k some English cognates might suggest.

ce A soft "ch" followed by an open "eh," as in "chin" plus "bed."

n A clear, single "n," flowing straight into the next syllable.

to A crisp, unaspirated "toh," with a pure o and no puff of air after the t, unlike the aspirated t at the start of English "top."

Hear it in a sentence

Costa cento euro.

It costs a hundred euros.

Listen: Costa cento euro.

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

In "Costa cento euro," cento is invariable and never takes an article the way English "a hundred" takes "a": Italian just says cento euro, not "un cento euro." Costa is the third-person singular of costare, used impersonally the way English uses "it costs."

Euro itself stays euro in the plural too, an invariable loanword, so cento euro doesn't take an -i ending; this catches out learners who expect regular Italian pluralization to apply.

Where English speakers slip

Reaching for a hard k sound, "KEN-toh," is common because English words like "cent" and "center" pronounce c-before-e inconsistently. "Cento" is unambiguous: always ch.

The other slip is adding an English-style article, saying something like "un cento" by analogy with "a hundred." Italian numbers above one never take an article at all.