German pronunciation generator: hear ü, ö and ch said right

Type a German word or sentence and hear it said in Standard German, umlauts and all. Free, no sign-up.

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How to pronounce German words

For longer German audio and more voices, see German text to speech. To spell out an English word by sound, use the phonetic spelling generator.

Type German

Type or paste up to 500 characters of German, or pick a sample. Type ä, ö, ü and ß as they are spelled.

Press play

Listen to the whole phrase, then pick a sample to hear one hard sound on its own.

Compare voices

Pick another voice from the menu and press play again to hear the same German from a different speaker.

German sounds English speakers find hard

German spelling is regular. These are the sounds that English either lacks or spells another way.

Ü and ö

Say ee, then round your lips as for oo without moving your tongue: that is ü. Start from ay and do the same for ö.

über [ˈyː.bɐ] · schön [ʃøːn] · Brücke [ˈbʁʏ.kə]

Two ch sounds

After e, i, ä, ö, ü and consonants, ch is a soft hiss, like the h in huge said firmly. After a, o, u and au it is the rough ch in Scottish loch.

ich [ɪç] · Milch [mɪlç] · ach [ax] · Buch [buːx]

Ei and ie

Ei is the eye sound and ie is ee. Wein (wine) and Wien (Vienna) differ only by this.

Wein [vaɪ̯n] · Wien [viːn]

Z, w and v

Z is ts, w is v, and v is usually f.

Zeit [tsaɪ̯t] · Wasser [ˈvasɐ] · Vater [ˈfaːtɐ]

Hard endings

A b, d or g at the end of a word is said as p, t or k, so Hund (dog) ends with a t.

Hund [hʊnt] · Tag [taːk] · gelb [ɡɛlp]

Custom German pronunciation for developers

German text is full of English product names, and teams disagree about how to say them. A pronunciation dictionary fixes one reading, so Nike is always naiki in every request.

A pronunciation dictionary is a list of words and how to say each one. Cartesia swaps every match for its sounds-like spelling before the text is read, on sonic-3 and newer.

Get an API key Read the pronunciation guide

pronunciation-dictionary.json

// Create the dictionary once, through the API or the Playground.
[
  { "text": "Nike", "pronunciation": "naiki" }
]

// Then pass its ID with each text-to-speech request.
{
  "model_id": "sonic-3",
  "language": "de",
  "pronunciation_dict_id": "<your dictionary ID>"
}

Pronunciation in other languages

All languages

Arabic pronunciation

ع and ح, the heavy consonants and long vowels, read aloud from Arabic script.

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Chinese pronunciation

The four tones, tone changes and retroflex sounds, in a Mandarin voice.

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French pronunciation

Nasal vowels, liaison and the French r, in a Parisian or Canadian French voice.

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Italian pronunciation

Double consonants, gli and gn, read by an Italian voice.

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Japanese pronunciation

Kanji and kana read aloud, with long vowels and small tsu, in Standard Japanese.

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Korean pronunciation

Plain, tense and aspirated consonants and the sound changes between syllables.

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Polish pronunciation

Sz and ś, cz and ć, rz and ł, and the nasal ą and ę.

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Portuguese pronunciation

Nasal ão, the Brazilian t and d, and the r, in a Brazilian voice.

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Spanish pronunciation

Rolled r, ñ and the jota, in a voice from Mexico or Spain.

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German pronunciation FAQs

How do you pronounce the German ü?

Say ee and hold it, then round your lips as if for oo without moving your tongue. The result is ü [y]. Type über or Brücke into the generator to hear it.

Is there a free German pronunciation tool?

Yes. The generator on this page reads any German text up to 500 characters aloud in a Standard German voice, free and with no account.

How do you pronounce Eichhörnchen?

[ˈaɪ̯çˌhœʁnçən], roughly EYE-kh-hurn-khen. It has two soft ch sounds and an ö, which is why it's a favorite test word. Press the Eichhörnchen sample above to hear it.

What is the difference between ich and ach?

Both are spelled ch. After a, o, u and au it is [x], the rough sound in Scottish loch. Everywhere else it is [ç], a softer hiss made further forward. Ich and ach in the samples above show both.

Can I download the German audio?

Yes, with a free Cartesia account. Make an MP3 or WAV of the same text in the Cartesia Playground, or request it from the text-to-speech API.

Can Cartesia read longer German text?

Yes. Cartesia's text-to-speech model speaks 44 languages, German among them. For voiceovers and apps, see the German text to speech page.

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