Spanish · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "vacío" in Spanish?

Q: How do you pronounce vacío in Spanish?

vacío is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /baˈsi.o/. It means “empty.” bah-SEE-oh, three beats — it starts with a b sound and the accent splits the i from the o.

bah-SEE-oh, three beats — it starts with a b sound and the accent splits the i from the o.

vacío /baˈsi.o/

Three syllables, va-CÍ-o, and the accent forces a hiatus. A weak i beside a strong o would normally form a diphthong and give a two-syllable "vacio"; the mark splits them apart and places the stress on the i. The feminine "vacía" does exactly the same thing, and the plurals keep the accent for the same reason.

Listen: vacío

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Sound it out

v A b sound. Spanish makes no distinction between b and v, so nothing here involves the teeth touching the lip.

a A wide-open "ah", unstressed but at full value.

cí Before an i, the c is a plain "s". Then a tight "ee" carrying the accent and the stress.

o A pure "oh" standing as its own syllable. Without the accent on the i, these two vowels would fuse into a single gliding beat.

Hear it in a sentence

El refrigerador está vacío.

The refrigerator is empty.

Listen: El refrigerador está vacío.

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"El refrigerador está vacío" uses estar, since emptiness is a current state rather than an essential property. "Refrigerador" is a five-syllable workout: the opening r is trilled, the g before e is a throaty sound like the j, and the final r ending puts the stress on the last syllable, re-fri-he-ra-DOR.

Where English speakers slip

Two things collapse at once. The v gets buzzed like an English v, and the ío gets squashed into one syllable, giving "va-SYO". Say a b at the front and give the i and o separate beats. The c also gets hardened into a k by readers who have not internalised that c before i is an s. Three corrections, and a three-syllable word emerges from a two-syllable guess.