Japanese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "空港" in Japanese?

Q: How do you pronounce 空港 in Japanese?

空港 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /kɯː.koː/. It means “airport.” ku-u-ko-o, four beats — two long vowels back to back, and neither u is rounded.

ku-u-ko-o, four beats — two long vowels back to back, and neither u is rounded.

空港 /kɯː.koː/

kuukou

Four beats built from two long vowels and nothing else. It's an unusually pure length exercise: the consonants are identical, so any unevenness in the word is purely a duration error. Both halves should take exactly the same time.

Listen: 空港

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Sound it out

kuu A quiet k opening onto an unrounded u held for two full counts. Lips flat throughout, and no rearticulation in the middle.

kou The same soft k again, now with an o held for another two counts. The u in this romaji is a length mark, not a vowel.

Hear it in a sentence

空港までタクシーで行きます。

Kuukou made takushii de ikimasu.

I am going to the airport by taxi.

Listen: 空港までタクシーで行きます。

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空港までタクシーで行きます contains タクシー (ta-ku-shi-i), four morae with a devoicing-prone ku and a long final i. So the sentence has three long vowels in its first two content words, which together account for most of its duration.

Where English speakers slip

"KOO-ko" halves the word: the first vowel rounded and shortened, the second shortened too. Spread the lips for the u, hold both vowels for two counts each, and keep the volume level — English speakers convert length into stress almost automatically.