LingoDrop
Italian · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "l'ospedale (m.)" in Italian?
loh-speh-DAH-leh, stressed on the third syllable. In IPA: /lo.spe.ˈda.le/. Unlike the English word "hospital," there's no h sound anywhere in it — Italian doesn't even spell one.
"Ospedale" is written as four syllables, o-spe-da-le, and the article "lo" collapses into an "l'" that attaches directly to that first "o," giving one smooth word, "lo-spe-da-le."
Listen: l'ospedale (m.)
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Sound it out
This is one of the few common Italian words whose English cognate ("hospital") is close enough in meaning to help but different enough in shape to trip people up on sound — there's no h anywhere, and the stress sits in a different place than in English.
Hear it in a sentence
L'ospedale è vicino alla stazione.
The hospital is near the station.
Listen: L'ospedale è vicino alla stazione.
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"L'ospedale è vicino alla stazione" uses "vicino a" (near to) with the contracted article "alla" (a + la), since "stazione" is feminine — Italian regularly fuses simple prepositions like "a," "di," and "in" with the article that follows, so learning these contractions as single units (alla, allo, al, ai) pays off across many sentences, not just this one.
"Ospedale" refers to the building or institution, the place you'd go for emergency care or to be admitted — for a routine visit to see a physician, Italian instead uses "andare dal dottore" or "andare dal medico," so the two phrases aren't interchangeable.
Where English speakers slip
Because the English cognate "hospital" starts with a clearly pronounced h, some English speakers instinctively add a puff of breath before the Italian "o" in "ospedale." Italian h is always silent, without exception, and "ospedale" doesn't even have an h in its spelling — the word simply starts on the vowel.
The other trap is stress: English "HOS-pi-tal" front-loads the stress, while Italian "ospedale" stresses the third syllable, o-spe-DA-le — carrying the English rhythm over makes the word sound rushed and oddly accented to Italian ears.