Help:IPA/Italian

This is the pronunciation key for IPA transcriptions of Italian on Wikipedia.

It provides a set of symbols to represent the pronunciation of Italian in Wikipedia articles, and example words that illustrate the sounds that correspond to them. Integrity must be maintained between the key and the transcriptions that link here; do not change any symbol or value without establishing consensus on the talk page first.

For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.

Shortcuts

The charts below show how the International Phonetic Alphabet represents pronunciations of Standard Italian in Wikipedia articles. For a guide to adding IPA characters to Wikipedia articles, see Template:IPA and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation § Entering IPA characters.

See Italian phonology and Italian orthography for a more thorough look at the sounds of Italian.

Consonants^[1]
IPA	Examples	English approximation
b	banca, cibo	about
d	dove, idra, dado	today
dz	zaino, azalea, mezzo^[2]^[3]	dads
dʒ	gelo, giù, magia	job
f	fatto, cifra, fon	fast
ɡ	gatto, agro, ghetto, glicosio^[4]	again
k	cosa, acuto, finché, quei, kiwi, koala	scar
l	lato, tela, glicosio^[4]	ladder
ʎ	figli, glielo, maglia^[3]	billion
m	mano, amare^[5]	mother
ɱ	anfibio, invece^[5]	comfort
n	nano, punto, pensare, mangiare^[5]	nest
ŋ	unghia, anche, dunque^[5]	sing
ɲ	gnocco, ogni^[3]^[5]	canyon
p	primo, ampio, apertura	spin
r	Roma, quattro, morte^[6]	trilled r
s	sano, scusa, presentire, pasto^[7]	sorry
ʃ	scena, scià, pesci^[3]	shoe
t	tranne, mito, altro	star
ts	zio, sozzo, marzo^[2]^[3]	cats
tʃ	certo, ciao, farmacia	check
v	vado, povero	vent
z	sbirro, presentare, asma^[7]	amazon
Non-native consonants
h	hobby, hertz^[8]	house
θ	Thatcher, Pérez^[9]	thing
x	jota, Bach, khamsin^[10]	loch (Scottish English)
ʒ	Fuji, garage, casual	vision

Vowels^[11]
IPA	Examples	English approximation
a	alto, sarà	fast (Scottish English)
e	vero, perché	fade
ɛ	etto, cioè	bed
i	viso, sì, zia	ski
o	ombra, otto	story
ɔ	otto, sarò	off
u	usi, ragù, tuo	rule
Non-native vowels
ø	viveur, goethiano, Churchill^[12]	murder (RP)
y	parure, brûlé, Führer^[13]	future (Scottish English)

Semivowels
IPA	Examples	English approximation
j	ieri, saio, più, Jesi	yes
w	uova, guado, qui	wine

Suprasegmentals
IPA	Examples	Explanation
ˈ	Cennini [tʃenˈniːni]	primary stress
ˌ	altamente [ˌaltaˈmente]	secondary stress^[14]
.	continuo [konˈtiːnu.o]	syllable break
ː	primo [ˈpriːmo]	long vowel^[15]

Notes

^ Except /z/, all consonants after a vowel and before /r/, /l/, a vowel or a semivowel may be geminated. Gemination in IPA is represented by doubling the consonant (fatto [ˈfatto], mezzo [ˈmɛddzo]), and can usually be told from orthography. After stressed vowels and certain prepositions and conjunctions, word-initial consonants also become geminated (syntactic gemination): va via [ˌva vˈviːa].
^ ^a ^b ⟨z⟩ represents both /ts/ and /dz/. The article on Italian orthography explains how they are used.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e /ts, dz, ʃ, ɲ, ʎ/ are always geminated after a vowel.
^ ^a ^b ⟨gli⟩ represents /ʎ/ or /ʎi/, except in roots of Greek origin, when preceded by another consonant, and in a few other words, where it represents /ɡli/.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e A nasal always assimilates to the place of articulation of the following consonant. It is bilabial [m] before /p, b, m/, labiodental [ɱ] before /f, v/, dental, alveolar or postalveolar [n] before /t, d, ts, dz, tʃ, dʒ, ʃ, l, r/, and velar [ŋ] before /k, ɡ/. Utterance-finally, it is always [n].
^ Non-geminate /r/ is generally realised as a monovibrant trill or flap [ɾ], particularly in unstressed syllables.
^ ^a ^b /s/ and /z/ contrast only intervocalically. Word-initially, after consonants, when geminated, and before voiceless consonants, only [s] is found. Before voiced consonants, only [z] is found.
^ /h/ is usually dropped.
^ /θ/ is usually pronounced as [t] in English loanwords, and [dz], [ts] (if spelled ⟨z⟩) or [s] (if spelled ⟨c⟩ or ⟨z⟩) in Spanish ones.
^ In Spanish loanwords, /x/ is usually pronounced as [h] or [k] or dropped. In German, Arabic and Russian ones, it is usually pronounced [k].
^ Italian contrasts seven monophthongs in stressed syllables. Open-mid vowels /ɛ, ɔ/ can appear only if the syllable is stressed (coperto [koˈpɛrto], quota [ˈkwɔːta]), close-mid vowels /e, o/ are found elsewhere (Boccaccio [bokˈkattʃo], amore [aˈmoːre]). Close and open vowels /i, u, a/ are unchanged in unstressed syllables, but word-final unstressed /i/ may become approximant [j] before vowels, which is known as synalepha (pari età [ˌparj eˈta]).
^ Open-mid [œ] or close-mid [ø] if it is stressed but usually [ø] if it is unstressed. May be replaced by [ɛ] (stressed) or [e] (stressed or unstressed).
^ /y/ is often pronounced as [u] or [ju].
^ Since Italian has no distinction between heavier or lighter vowels (like the English o in conclusion vs o in nomination), a defined secondary stress, even in long words, is extremely rare.
^ Primarily stressed vowels are long in non-final open syllables: fato [ˈfaːto], fatto [ˈfatto].

External links

Dizionario italiano multimediale e multilingue d'ortografia e di pronunzia (in Italian) [not based on IPA]
Dizionario di pronuncia italiana online by Luciano Canepari (in Italian) [phonemic, based on IPA]

[1] Except /z/, all consonants after a vowel and before /r/, /l/, a vowel or a semivowel may be geminated. Gemination in IPA is represented by doubling the consonant (fatto [ˈfatto], mezzo [ˈmɛddzo]), and can usually be told from orthography. After stressed vowels and certain prepositions and conjunctions, word-initial consonants also become geminated (syntactic gemination): va via [ˌva vˈviːa].

[z-2] ⟨z⟩ represents both /ts/ and /dz/. The article on Italian orthography explains how they are used.

[geminated-3] /ts, dz, ʃ, ɲ, ʎ/ are always geminated after a vowel.

[gli-4] ⟨gli⟩ represents /ʎ/ or /ʎi/, except in roots of Greek origin, when preceded by another consonant, and in a few other words, where it represents /ɡli/.

[nasal-5] A nasal always assimilates to the place of articulation of the following consonant. It is bilabial [m] before /p, b, m/, labiodental [ɱ] before /f, v/, dental, alveolar or postalveolar [n] before /t, d, ts, dz, tʃ, dʒ, ʃ, l, r/, and velar [ŋ] before /k, ɡ/. Utterance-finally, it is always [n].

[6] Non-geminate /r/ is generally realised as a monovibrant trill or flap [ɾ], particularly in unstressed syllables.

[s-z-7] /s/ and /z/ contrast only intervocalically. Word-initially, after consonants, when geminated, and before voiceless consonants, only [s] is found. Before voiced consonants, only [z] is found.

[8] /h/ is usually dropped.

[9] /θ/ is usually pronounced as [t] in English loanwords, and [dz], [ts] (if spelled ⟨z⟩) or [s] (if spelled ⟨c⟩ or ⟨z⟩) in Spanish ones.

[10] In Spanish loanwords, /x/ is usually pronounced as [h] or [k] or dropped. In German, Arabic and Russian ones, it is usually pronounced [k].

[11] Italian contrasts seven monophthongs in stressed syllables. Open-mid vowels /ɛ, ɔ/ can appear only if the syllable is stressed (coperto [koˈpɛrto], quota [ˈkwɔːta]), close-mid vowels /e, o/ are found elsewhere (Boccaccio [bokˈkattʃo], amore [aˈmoːre]). Close and open vowels /i, u, a/ are unchanged in unstressed syllables, but word-final unstressed /i/ may become approximant [j] before vowels, which is known as synalepha (pari età [ˌparj eˈta]).

[12] Open-mid [œ] or close-mid [ø] if it is stressed but usually [ø] if it is unstressed. May be replaced by [ɛ] (stressed) or [e] (stressed or unstressed).

[13] /y/ is often pronounced as [u] or [ju].

[14] Since Italian has no distinction between heavier or lighter vowels (like the English o in conclusion vs o in nomination), a defined secondary stress, even in long words, is extremely rare.

[15] Primarily stressed vowels are long in non-final open syllables: fato [ˈfaːto], fatto [ˈfatto].

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

[10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

[14]

[15]

v t e International Phonetic Alphabet keys
Adyghe Afrikaans Albanian Amharic Arabic Modern Standard Egyptian Hejazi Lebanese Tunisian Armenian Assamese Asturian Australian languages Azerbaijani Basque Belarusian Bengali Berber Breton Bulgarian Burmese Catalan Standard Insular Chinese Mandarin Cantonese Hokkien Jin Wu Xiang Corsican Czech Danish Dari Dutch English Old English Emilian-Romagnol Esperanto Estonian Extremaduran Fijian Finnish Franco-Provençal French Galician Georgian German Standard Alemannic Colognian Greek Greenlandic Gujarati Haitian Creole Hawaiian Hebrew Hindi Hmong Hungarian Icelandic Igbo Indonesian Inuktitut Inupiaq Irish Isan Italian Central Japanese Kazakh Khmer Korean Kurdish Kyrgyz Lakota Lao Latin Latvian Ligurian Lithuanian Lombard Luxembourgish Macedonian Malagasy Malay Malayalam Maltese Manx Māori Marathi Marshallese Mauritian Creole Mayan Mongolian Mirandese Nahuatl Navajo Neapolitan Nepali Northern Thai Norwegian Occitan Odia Pashto Persian Piedmontese Polish Portuguese Punjabi Quechua Romanian Romansh Russian Sanskrit Sardinian Scottish Gaelic Serbo-Croatian Shan Sicilian Slovak Slovene Sorbian Spanish Swahili Swazi Swedish Sylheti Tagalog Tai Lue Tajik Tamil Tatar Telugu Thai Tibetan Tigrinya Turkish Turkmen Ukrainian Urdu Uzbek Venetian Vietnamese Walloon Welsh West Frisian Xhosa Yiddish Yoruba Zhuang Zulu
Comparisons	IPA conventions for English English dialects Wikipedia pronunciation respelling Other English pronunciation respellings
Introductory guides	Symbols For English speakers Manual of Style: Pronunciation

Help:IPA/Italian

See also

Notes

Further reading

External links