Spanish · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "el teléfono" in Spanish?

Q: How do you pronounce el teléfono in Spanish?

el teléfono is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /el teˈle.fo.no/. It means “telephone.” el teh-LEH-foh-noh — the accent holds the stress on the second syllable of four.

el teh-LEH-foh-noh — the accent holds the stress on the second syllable of four.

el teléfono /el teˈle.fo.no/

Four syllables, te-LÉ-fo-no, and the accent is mandatory. The word ends in a vowel, so the default would give te-le-FO-no. The mark pulls the beat back to the third-from-last syllable, which Spanish always writes out. The plural "teléfonos" keeps it for the same reason.

Listen: el teléfono

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Sound it out

te A dental t with no puff of air and a short "eh" as in "bed", unstressed.

lé A bright forward l and a second short "eh", carrying the accent and the stress.

fo A normal f and a pure "oh", unstressed but fully rounded.

no A clean n and a second "oh", identical in quality to the first.

Hear it in a sentence

Mi teléfono no tiene batería.

My phone has no battery.

Listen: Mi teléfono no tiene batería.

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"Mi teléfono no tiene batería" ends on a word whose accent breaks the i from the a, giving five beats: ba-te-RÍ-a. Two accents in one sentence doing different jobs — one pulling stress back, one splitting a diphthong. "Tiene" packs its ie into a single beat.

Where English speakers slip

The English "telephone" front-stresses the word and reduces everything else, giving "TEL-uh-fone". Spanish has four full beats with the peak on LÉ. The two o vowels then want differentiating, when they should be twins. And ignoring the accent produces "te-le-FO-no", which is exactly what the mark forbids.