German pronunciation
VOWELS
| We pronounce SHORT vowels similarly to Slovak, openly. They occur: Before double consonants | Klasse, bitte |
|---|---|
| Before hard consonants | dort, machen, Kind |
| We pronounce LONG vowels closed. They occur: At the end of a syllable | guten (gútn) |
| In the form of doubled vowels | Haar, Tee (hár, té) |
| Before h (which we do not pronounce) | Ihnen, wohne, geht (ínen, vóne, gét) |
| Before the so-called sharp s, written as ß | Spaß, Straße (špás, štráse) |
| In monosyllabic words with a hard ending | spät, Tag (špét, tág) |
VOWEL OVERRUNS
| ä is pronounced like an open e | später, fährt (špéter, fért) |
|---|---|
| In the case of other fronted vowels, we round the lips. In the case of ö we pronounce e, in the case of ü we pronounce i. | Österreich, tschüs (Ésteraich, čis) |
DIPHTHONGS
| We write (we pronounce) | Examples |
|---|---|
| eu, äu (oj) | neu, Häuser (noj, hojzer) |
| au (au) | Haus, auf |
| ei, ai (ai) | nein, Mai (nain, maj) |
| ie (í) | Wien, Liebe (Vín, líbe) |
| ie - end (ie) | Familie |
CONSONANTS
| We write (we pronounce) | Examples |
|---|---|
| chs (ks) | wachsen (vaksen) |
| ck (k) | Rostock, packen (Rostok, paken) |
| di, ti, ni (hard - dy, ty, ny) | dir, nicht, Kantine (dyr, nycht, kantýne) |
| h - at the beginning (h) | haben, Haus (hábn, haus) |
| h - at the end and in the middle (not pronounced, only lengthens the vowel) | froh, fahren (fró, fáren) |
| ig (ich) | Leipzig (Lajpcich) |
| ph (f) | Physik (fyzik) |
| qu (kv) | bequem (bekvajem) |
| tion (tsion) | Funktion (funkcion) |
| tsch (č) | deutsch, tschechisch (dojč, čechiš) |
| tz (c) | sitzen (zicen) |
| v (f) | viel (fíl) |
| w (v) | Wagner (Vágner) |
| z (c) | zehn, Franz (cén, Franc |
The letter 's' in German is pronounced in several ways
| We write (we pronounce) | Examples |
|---|---|
| s (z) | sein, besuchen (zain, bezúchen) |
| ss (s) | bisschen (bischen) |
| ß (s) | Straße (štráse) |
| sch (š) | tschechish (čéchiš) |
| sp - at the beginning (šp) | Sport, sprechen (šport, špréchen) |
| st - na at the beginning (št) | Student (študent) |