Chinese (Mandarin)/Pronunciation of Finals

Pronunciation of finals PinyinIPAFinal-only formDescriptionSingle finalsa[a:]a as in "father"o[ɔ:]oas in "got" in British English, but not in American English.e[ɤə]e a backward, unrounded vowel: first place the tongue between [ŋ] and [ə] to produce [ɤ], and then lower the tongue to slide to [ə] a bit like English "duh", but not as "open"(ê)[e]êas in "get"i[i:]yias in "he"(-i)[ɻ̩], [ɹ̩]i is a buzzed continuation of the consonant when it appears after these initials: z-, c-, s-, zh-, ch-, sh- and r-u[u:]wuas in "who"ü[y:]yuas in German "üben" or French "lune" (to get this sound, say "ee" with rounded lips)Plural finalsai[ai̯]ai like "eye", but a bit lighterei[ei̯]ei as in "say"ui[uei̯]weilike "way", but a bit lighterao[au̯]ao like "cow", the a is much more audible than the oou[ou̯]ou as in "so", "dough"iu[iəu̯]youas in "Leo"ie[i̯e]yelike "yet"üe[y̯e]yueas pinyin ü + êer[aɚ̯]eras in "bar" in American English (the r is always pronounced) (this final doesn't combine with any initials)an[an]an as in "stun", "fun"en[ən]en as in "taken"in[in]yinas in "in"un[u̯ən]wenas pinyin u + enün[yn]yunas pinyin ü + nang[aŋ]ang as in "young", like "song" in American Englisheng[əŋ]engreplace the [n] in en with [ŋ]ing[iŋ]yingas in "thing"ong[ɔŋ] replace the [n] in "yawn" with [ŋ] Rolled finals Rolled finals (儿化音) are a phenomenon in spoken Mandarin. People from northern China like to roll their tongue when saying specific words (usually nouns and verbs) in daily dialogues. On the other hand, people from southern China rarely do that. Foreign Chinese learners are not quite suggested to learn so, as this is sometimes considered as a northern China accent instead of standard Mandarin. This table's purpose is to enable Chinese learners to recognize and understand them when hearing somebody using them. PinyinIPAExplanatione'r[ɤ˞] as e + er (not to be confused with the final er on its own, e'r only exists with an initial character before it)ar, air, anr air, anr[aɚ̯] as ai + er, an + eraor[au̯˞] as ao + erour[ou̯˞] as ou + erangr[ãɚ̯̃] as ang + eriar, ianr[i̯aɚ̯] as ia + er, ian + erinr, ir[i̯ɚ] as in + er, i + eringr[i̯ɚ̃] as ing + erur[u˞] as u + eruor[u̯o˞] as uo + eruir[u̯ɚ] as ui + erongr[ʊ̃˞] as ong + erür[y̯ɚ] as ü + er