LingoDrop
Korean · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "왜" in Korean?
wae. One syllable: round the lips for the w and open immediately onto the short flat ㅐ.
wae
A single beat. As a question word it is short enough that learners want to lengthen it for emphasis, and Korean instead puts the interrogative force in the sentence ending, leaving 왜 itself brief and flat.
Listen: 왜
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
왜 늦었어요?
Wae neujeosseoyo?
Why are you late?
Listen: 왜 늦었어요?
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왜 늦었어요? pairs it with 늦었어요, where the ㅈ batchim of 늦 resyllabifies forward and voices, giving neu-jeo-sseo-yo. The question moves from a pure vowel-and-glide syllable straight into a chain of consonant migrations.
Where English speakers slip
Saying it as two syllables, 'wa-eh', is the commonest error, and pronouncing it like English 'way' with a long vowel and a glide is the second. It is one short beat ending on a flat, low vowel. Lengthening it also makes the question sound accusatory, which is a tone problem on top of a pronunciation one.