Chinese Pinyin
The following are two tables to show you the Chinese pinyin system. Most of the vowels and consonants have the same pronunciation as English vowels and consonants. The writings of pinyin is much like the English alphabet.
Vowel Sound
Vowel/Consonaut Combinations
Mandarin has quite a few dipthongs (composite sounds) and vowel and consonant combinations.Most of these have counterpart in English.
Consonant Sound
Tone of Pinyin
Tone plays a very important role in the meaning of the characters. Different tones in pinyin will lead to different character and meaning of each Chinese word. There are mainly four tonal categories in pinyin: high, high rising, low falling and high falling tone.
high, high rising, low falling-rising, high-falling, neutral
Example:
Different tone in Pinyin will have different character. And the meaning of the character will also be different.
Related Links:
Useful Chinese Phrasebook
Some useful words and sentences people usually to use in their trip, that can be pronounced by the phonetic English. more Chinese Phrasebook
Chinese Lesson
We have prepared an extensive collection of most frequently used daily expressions and sentences to help you. You will be able to simply communicate with Chinese as long as you remeber all of them. more Chinese Lesson
Lesson 01: Greeting
It is helpful to know some simple Chinese words and sentences when you meet Chinese people. They will be very happy when seeing a foreigner can speak some Chinese.
- Top - or Back to - Learning Chinese
Design your own tour with our help to meet your unique interests, You don't have to compromise, do exactly what you want to do! Let us assist you to tailor-make your own China Experience.