LingoDrop
Italian · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "lo spazzolino (m.)" in Italian?
spaht-tsoh-LEE-noh, stress on the third syllable, with a sharp "ts" sound in the middle. In IPA: /spat.tsoˈli.no/.
Four syllables, spaz, zo, li, and no, with the stress landing on "li," the same pattern Italian diminutives almost always follow (compare "tavolino," small table, stressed the same way).
Listen: lo spazzolino (m.)
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Sound it out
The double z here isn't a "z" sound at all, it's a crisp "ts," and remembering that the stress sits on "li" rather than the front of the word is the other key to this one.
Hear it in a sentence
Il mio spazzolino è nuovo.
My toothbrush is new.
Listen: Il mio spazzolino è nuovo.
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"Spazzolino" is the diminutive of "spazzola" (brush), formed with the common -ino ending that also builds words like "tavolino" (small table) and "bambino" (child, literally "little" one). That -ino suffix consistently pulls the stress onto itself, which is why the emphasis moves from the front of "spazzola" to "li" here.
The example, "Il mio spazzolino è nuovo," places "mio" after the article "il," the standard Italian possessive pattern (article + possessive + noun) that has no direct English equivalent, since English never pairs "the" with "my" in front of the same noun.
Where English speakers slip
The most common mistake is misplacing the stress at the front, saying "SPAHT-tso-lee-no" by analogy with the base word "spazzola," which is stressed on its first syllable. The diminutive ending overrides that pattern and shifts the emphasis onto "li," the way it does in nearly every Italian -ino word.
The other frequent slip is softening zz into an English z sound, saying "spa-ZOH-lee-no." Italian zz is almost always a crisp, voiceless "ts" in this kind of word, closer to the sound at the end of English "pizza" or "cats" than to the buzzing z of "zoo."