Chinese sounds English doesn’t have: zh, ch, sh, r, j, q, x and ü

October 9, 2026 · 8 min read

For an English speaker, the sounds of Chinese fall into two groups. Most are familiar: m, n, l, f, s, a, u sound almost as in English. But a few have to be built from scratch because English doesn’t have them: j, q, x, the vowel ü, the e of hē and the buzzing i of shi and si. zh, ch, sh and r are close to English but made with the tongue curled back. On top of that comes the habit that gets in the way most: reading pinyin letters as English letters. Below is how each Chinese sound is pronounced, with recordings — press a syllable to hear it.

Chinese consonants: with a puff of air and without

You might think b and p differ the way they do in English, by voicing. In Chinese both sounds in the pair are voiceless, and the difference is the breath: one is said calmly, the other with a strong puff of air, as if a light “h” followed the consonant. That’s aspiration. The good news: English already has it. Say “pin” and “spin” with your hand in front of your mouth — you feel air on the first and almost none on the second. English never uses that difference to tell words apart, so you’ve never noticed it. Chinese does.

• b — p. bā pā Chinese b is like the p in “spin”: no puff. Chinese p is the p in “pin”, with an even stronger puff.
• d — t. dà tà Same idea: d is close to the t in “stop”, t to the t in “top”.
• g — k. gǔ kǔ g is close to the k in “skin”, k to the k in “kin”.
• z — c, zh — ch, j — q. zì cì zhī chī jī qī In each pair the first sound has no puff, the second has one.

Checking yourself is easy: hold your palm or a strip of paper to your lips. On pa, ta, ku the paper should flutter; on ba, da, gu it should barely move. If you say ba with a fully voiced English b, people will understand you, though the accent will show. But if you say pa without the puff, a Chinese listener hears ba — and that’s a different word: 爸爸 bàba — dad, but 怕 pà — to be afraid.

How to pronounce Chinese z c s, zh ch sh r and j q x

These are three rows of hissing and hushing sounds. Within a row the tongue stays in the same place, so it’s easier to learn them row by row than one by one.

• z, c, s — tongue tip at the teeth. z is like the “ds” in “kids”, c like the “ts” in “cats” with a strong puff, s is a plain s. English has “ts” only at the end of words, so starting a syllable with it takes a little practice. zā cì sā
• zh, ch, sh, r — tongue tip curled back. Raise the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth, just behind the ridge above your upper teeth, and pull it slightly back. zh is like the j in “judge” with the tongue curled back and without voice, ch like the ch in “church” in the same position with a puff, sh like the sh in “shirt” said further back. zhā chū shā
• j, q, x — flat tongue, tip down. The tip of the tongue rests against the lower teeth, the middle of the tongue rises to the palate, the lips are spread as in a smile. The sounds come out soft: j is like the j in “jeep”, q like the ch in “cheap” with a puff, x something between s and sh — the sh in “she” said with a smile. jiā qū xiā

The difference is easiest to hear in pairs. Listen to each pair several times in a row:

• zh and j: zhā jiā — a hard sound with the tongue curled back and a soft one with a flat tongue.
• ch and q: chū qū — here the vowel changes too: after q the letter u is read as ü.
• sh and x: shī xī — a deep “sh” and a soft “sh” with a smile.
• s and sh: sī shī — tongue at the teeth and tongue pulled back.

A hint from pinyin itself: j, q, x only come before i and ü, and zh, ch, sh, r, z, c, s never do. So the syllable tells you which row you’re in. How all the combinations are spelled — in our article on the Chinese alphabet.

One more letter that looks familiar but isn’t quite: h. Chinese h is rougher than the English one, made further back in the mouth — close to the “ch” in Scottish “loch”, said softly. hēto drink hǎogood

The Chinese r sound

The letter r is confusing: it isn’t a rolled r, and it isn’t quite the English r either. The tongue doesn’t vibrate or tap. It sits just as for sh — tip curled back — and you add voice. The result is close to the “s” in “pleasure”, but softer and with less buzz; many speakers say it so lightly that it sounds almost like an English r. That “pleasure” quality is why the old Wade–Giles spelling wrote rén as “jen”.

• 人rénperson
• 热rèhot
• 肉ròumeat
• 日rìday (of the month, in writing)

A way to find the sound: hold a long sh without moving your tongue and switch on your voice — that’s the Chinese r. Then add a vowel: shì rì.

Chinese vowels: e, ü and the -i that isn’t “ee”

e isn’t the e in “bed”. When e stands alone in a syllable, it’s said further back: mouth half open, lips relaxed, tongue pulled back — like saying “oh” without rounding your lips, or the u in “fun” pushed back in the throat. èhungry hēto drink gē In ie, üe and ei, e sounds closer to the e in “yes” or “hey”.

ü — “ee” with lips for “oo”. Say “ee” and, without moving your tongue, push your lips into a tight circle — the French u in “tu” or the German ü. English “you” won’t do: it’s two sounds in a row, ü is one. Compare: lùroad lǜgreen, nǔ nǚfemale. The dots are written only after n and l, where both versions exist. After j, q, x and y they’re dropped, but the sound stays the same: 去 qù — to go, 鱼 yú — fish, 学 xué — to learn.

-i after zh, ch, sh, r, z, c, s. In zhi, chi, shi, ri, zi, ci, si the letter i isn’t “ee”. The tongue stays where it was for the consonant, and the consonant simply carries on with voice. After z, c, s you get a buzz, like holding the z in “zzz”; after zh, ch, sh, r it’s close to the “ir” in American “shirt”, without the t. sìfour shíten chīto eat A real “ee” comes after the other consonants: xī qī.

Final -n and -ng

These work just like the end of “sin” and “sing”. For -n the tip of the tongue presses against the ridge behind the upper teeth. For -ng the tip stays down and the back of the tongue rises to the soft palate; the sound goes through the nose, and there’s no g at the end — “singer”, not “finger”. The vowel before them differs a little too. And one spelling trap: in ian, as in 天 tiān, the a sounds more like the e in “yes”.

• an — ang: ān āng, fànmeal fàngto put
• in — ing: yīn yīng, xīnnew xīngstar
• en — eng: ēn ēng, méndoor mèngdream

English sounds Chinese doesn’t have

The reverse list is useful too: part of an accent is English sounds we add out of habit.

• No “th”. Neither the th of “think” nor the th of “this” exists in standard Chinese.
• No “v”. In the standard pronunciation w is made with the lips alone, like a short “oo” before a vowel — an ordinary English w: 我 wǒ — I, me, 问 wèn — to ask. Some speakers say something close to a v, but that isn’t the model.
• No consonant clusters or final stops. A syllable is simple: a consonant at the start, a vowel part and maybe -n or -ng at the end. Nothing like “str” or “-sts”, and no syllable ends in t, k, s or d.
• No swallowed vowels. English squeezes unstressed vowels into a quick “uh” — think of the a’s in “banana”. In Chinese every syllable keeps its full vowel and its tone; only neutral-tone syllables get short and light.

That’s also why the older spellings you still see in English — Peking, Tao, kung fu, or Wade–Giles “jen” for rén and “ch’i” for qì — help you recognize a name but don’t teach pronunciation. More on how these systems work in our article on Chinese romanization.

Chinese sounds: getting them right in three steps

• Listen to pairs, not single syllables. One zha on its own tells you nothing; the pair zha — jia shows the difference at once. Every syllable in the pinyin chart has audio: open neighboring columns and press them in turn.
• Record yourself. Your own voice sounds different from the inside than from outside. Record a pair of syllables right after the speaker and play both recordings back to back.
• Compare one feature at a time. First only the puff of air (ba — pa), then only the tongue position (sa — sha — xia), then only the lips (lu — lü). That way you know exactly what to fix.
• Move on to words. A sound sticks inside a word, and a word also has a tone. The melody of syllables is in our article on Chinese tones, the overall plan in our article on Chinese pronunciation.