Spanish · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "por qué" in Spanish?

Q: How do you pronounce por qué in Spanish?

por qué is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /poɾ ˈke/. It means “why.” por KEH, two words — the u is silent and the stress falls on the second word.

por KEH, two words — the u is silent and the stress falls on the second word.

por qué /poɾ ˈke/

Two separate words with one peak, on QUÉ. The accent marks it as a question word, just as it does in "qué" alone. Compare the one-word "porque" (because), which has no accent and is stressed POR-que — so the pair differs in spacing, accent and rhythm all at once, even though the letters are identical.

Listen: por qué

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

Sound it out

por An unaspirated p, a pure "oh", and a single tap of the r. Unstressed, leaning onto the word after it.

qué A hard k with the u completely silent, plus a short "eh" carrying the accent and the stress. Spanish writes qu before e purely to keep the c hard.

Hear it in a sentence

¿Por qué llegaste tarde?

Why did you arrive late?

Listen: ¿Por qué llegaste tarde?

Free browser voice. Hear it read by a real native speaker inside the LingoDrop app.

"¿Por qué llegaste tarde?" uses the two-word question form. The answer would use the one-word "porque", which is the whole reason the distinction matters. "Llegaste" opens with the double l as a y sound and is stressed lle-GAS-te, second-to-last, with no accent needed.

Where English speakers slip

Pronouncing the u gives "por KWEH", the reflex from English "quest". It is silent after q. The written form is where the real damage happens: "por qué" asks a question, "porque" gives a reason, and "por que" and "porqué" are two further variants with narrower uses. Learn the first two properly and the others rarely come up.