LingoDrop
Spanish · Pronunciation Guide
How do you pronounce "el esposo" in Spanish?
e-les-POH-soh — three s sounds, all hissed, none of them buzzing.
Three syllables, es-PO-so, with the weight on the second-to-last, following the default rule for a vowel-final word. The plural "esposos" can mean husbands or, by the masculine-default convention, a married couple — context decides. The word also means handcuffs in the plural, which is a genuinely useful thing to know before making a joke.
Listen: el esposo
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Sound it out
Hear it in a sentence
Mi esposo cocina los domingos.
My husband cooks on Sundays.
Listen: Mi esposo cocina los domingos.
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"Mi esposo cocina los domingos" uses "los domingos" for every Sunday, where the plural article does the work of English on. "Cocina" has a hard c before o and a soft c before i, so it is ko-SEE-na. Say "mi esposo" and the i links into the e without a break.
Where English speakers slip
Both s sounds get voiced into z's by English reflex — "es-POH-zo" — when Spanish keeps them hissed throughout. The p also wants an English puff. And regionally, "marido" is more common than "esposo" in much of Spain and parts of Latin America, so both are worth recognising even though you only need to produce one.