Spanish · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "la puerta" in Spanish?

Q: How do you pronounce la puerta in Spanish?

la puerta is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /la ˈpweɾ.ta/. It means “door.” lah PWEHR-tah, two beats in the noun — the ue glides into a single sound.

lah PWEHR-tah, two beats in the noun — the ue glides into a single sound.

la puerta /la ˈpweɾ.ta/

PUER-ta: two syllables, and the first carries the beat because the ue counts as one diphthong and the word ends in a vowel. The plural "puertas" keeps it. Note that the related "portal" and "portero" drop the ue back to a plain o, since the diphthong only surfaces under stress.

Listen: la puerta

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Sound it out

la A bright forward l and a wide "ah", unstressed.

puer An unaspirated p, then the u glides into the e as a w, closed by a single tap of the r. One beat, "pwehr", carrying the stress.

ta A dental t with no puff of air and a wide-open "ah", the feminine ending.

Hear it in a sentence

Esa puerta está abierta.

That door is open.

Listen: Esa puerta está abierta.

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"Esa puerta está abierta" uses estar for a temporary state and makes the participle feminine to agree. "Abierta" also contains an ie diphthong in one beat, so the sentence has two words with glides — PWEHR-ta and a-BYEHR-ta — both of which English wants to split apart.

Where English speakers slip

Break the ue into two beats and you get "poo-EHR-ta", but the u is a glide belonging to the first syllable. Then the r bends the vowel backward English-style, producing "PWAIR-ta". Keep the "eh" clean and flick the tongue once. The p also wants an English puff, and the final a wants reducing.