Spanish · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "cuánto" in Spanish?

Q: How do you pronounce cuánto in Spanish?

cuánto is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /ˈkwan.to/. It means “how much.” KWAHN-toh, two beats — the ua glides into one sound and the accent flags a question.

KWAHN-toh, two beats — the ua glides into one sound and the accent flags a question.

cuánto /ˈkwan.to/

Two syllables, CUÁN-to, and the accent marks the interrogative rather than moving the beat, since a vowel-final word is already front-stressed by default. Unlike "quién", this word agrees fully — "cuánta", "cuántos", "cuántas" — and all four forms keep both the accent and the stress placement.

Listen: cuánto

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Sound it out

cuá A hard k with no puff of air, then the u glides into the a as a w. One beat, "kwah", carrying the accent and the stress.

nto A released n, a dental t with no aspiration, and a pure "oh". American English would flap that t into a d — resist it.

Hear it in a sentence

¿Cuánto cuesta esto?

How much does this cost?

Listen: ¿Cuánto cuesta esto?

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"¿Cuánto cuesta esto?" is the shopping sentence, and it pairs two words beginning with the same hard k plus glide: CUÁN-to and CUES-ta. "Cuesta" shows the stem change from "costar", with the o splitting into ue under stress. Say "cuesta esto" and the final a merges with the following e.

Where English speakers slip

Stretch the ua into two syllables and you get "koo-AHN-to" where a single glide belongs. It is a single glide. The t then wants flapping into a d, American-style, producing "KWAHN-doh" — which would collide with "cuándo" and change the question entirely. Agreement is the other trap: "cuántos años tienes" needs the plural, and "cuánto años" is a common but audible slip.