How to Pronounce 'Creer': Spanish Pronunciation Guide

Q: How do you pronounce creer in Spanish?

creer is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /kɾeˈeɾ/. It means “to believe / to think.” kreh-EHR — two separate e sounds, so it is two beats, not one long vowel.

How do you pronounce "creer" in Spanish?

kreh-EHR — two separate e sounds, so it is two beats, not one long vowel.

creer /kɾeˈeɾ/

Two syllables, cre-ER, with the beat on the second because the word ends in r. The double e is a hiatus, meaning the two vowels belong to separate syllables even though nothing marks the split — Spanish treats two strong vowels side by side as automatically separate. In the past tense that hiatus needs an accent to survive: "creí" and "creyó" both carry marks.

Listen: creer

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Sound it out

cr A hard k with no aspiration, followed immediately by a single tap of the r. The tongue flicks forward once; it never curls back the way an English r does.

ee Two identical vowels in a row, each getting its own syllable: "eh-EH". Spanish does not merge doubled vowels into one long sound the way English does in "seen" or "tree".

r Another single tap to close the word. Both r's here are taps — neither is trilled.

Hear it in a sentence

Creo que va a llover.

I think it's going to rain.

Listen: Creo que va a llover.

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"Creo que va a llover" uses "creo", where the stress falls on the first e — CREH-o — the reverse of the infinitive's pattern. "Llover" begins with the double l as a y sound, so yoh-BER, with the v pronounced as a soft b. And "va a" puts two identical a sounds together, which speakers merge into one slightly longer vowel.

Where English speakers slip

"Kreer", rhyming with English "career", is the near-universal first reading — one long vowel where the double e should be two beats. Spanish gives each e its own beat. The r's cause the second problem: the opening cr cluster tempts English speakers into a curled r, which muffles the k, and the final r gets stretched. Both should be quick forward taps. Meaning-wise, note that "creer" covers both believing and thinking-as-opinion, so "creo que" is how you say I think that.