Japanese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "入る" in Japanese?

Q: How do you pronounce 入る in Japanese?

入る is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ha.i.ɾɯ/. It means “to enter.” ha-i-ru, three beats — the "ha" and "i" are separate, so it's never the English word "hire."

ha-i-ru, three beats — the "ha" and "i" are separate, so it's never the English word "hire."

入る /ha.i.ɾɯ/

hairu

Count it as three, with the melody peaking on the middle beat. The vowel sequence a-i in the middle is where the beat count usually goes missing: English hears one syllable there and delivers one beat, turning a three-mora verb into a two-mora one. Count them out until three feels natural.

Listen: 入る

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Sound it out

ha A soft exhalation shaped into an h, then a bright open a. Considerably gentler than the h in English "hard."

i A whole beat of its own, short and tense. It follows the a with no consonant between them, and the pair must not compress into a single diphthong.

ru The alveolar tap — the tongue tip bounces off the ridge behind the upper teeth and is gone. No friction, no trill, no lip rounding on the u that follows.

Hear it in a sentence

部屋に入ってもいいですか。

Heya ni haitte mo ii desu ka?

May I come into the room?

Listen: 部屋に入ってもいいですか。

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部屋に入ってもいいですか uses the te-form 入って, which adds a geminate: ha-i-t-te, four morae with a silent held beat before the t releases. Contrasting that with the plain three-beat 入る shows how the small っ inserts pure time rather than changing any sound's identity.

Where English speakers slip

The reflex is to say "HI-roo" — the a and i fused into the vowel of "high," a stressed first syllable, and a rounded English-r ending. That collapse costs a whole mora. Separate the two vowels into distinct pulses, tap once for the r, and keep the lips flat throughout the final u.