How to Pronounce '私たち': Japanese Pronunciation Guide

Q: How do you pronounce 私たち in Japanese?

私たち is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /wa.ta.ɕi.ta.tɕi/. It means “we / us.” wa-ta-shi-ta-chi, five even beats, with the final i often whispering away to nothing.

How do you pronounce "私たち" in Japanese?

wa-ta-shi-ta-chi, five even beats, with the final i often whispering away to nothing.

私たち /wa.ta.ɕi.ta.tɕi/

watashitachi

Five morae in a strict even line. What makes this word a genuine test is that two of those five morae are prone to devoicing, so a native pronunciation has whispered patches in the middle and at the end — yet the total duration is unchanged. Devoicing removes the voice, not the beat.

Listen: 私たち

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

Sound it out

wa Lips compressed rather than pushed forward, then a bright open a.

ta Dental t with a quiet release, then the same a again — no reduction in the second syllable the way English would demand.

shi A soft palatal hiss, thinner than English sh. Here it sits before another voiceless consonant, which makes devoicing likely — the vowel can shrink to a whisper.

ta The plural suffix begins. Same dental t as before; the join between 私 and たち is seamless, with no pause and no restart.

chi One affricate, tongue blade to palate, lighter than English ch. At the end of the word this i also tends to go voiceless, so the word can finish on nothing but air.

Hear it in a sentence

私たちは日本語を勉強します。

Watashitachi wa nihongo o benkyou shimasu.

We study Japanese.

Listen: 私たちは日本語を勉強します。

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

私たちは日本語を勉強します is long enough to expose any rhythm problems. 日本語 is four morae (ni-ho-n-go) with a nasal beat, and 勉強 is four more (be-n-kyo-o) with a nasal plus a long vowel. Between them and the five of 私たち, this is essentially a sixteen-beat sentence, and English speakers habitually deliver it in about ten.

Where English speakers slip

The classic result is "wa-TA-shi-ta-chi" with an English stress peak on the second beat and every vowel fully voiced. Two corrections: even out the emphasis so nothing peaks, and let the shi and the final chi lose their voicing. A learner who voices every vowel fully sounds like they're reading the word aloud rather than speaking it.