1.5 Compound finals

In this lesson you will learn how to pronounce and use a common set of finals known as compound finals. Since compound finals combine a vowel with one or two secondary vowels, you will use this lesson to practice and perfect these sounds.

Compound finals comprise a main vowel and a secondary vowel:

• ai ei ao ou
• ia ie iao iu (iou)
• ua uo uai ui (uei)
• üe
• er

When the initials vowels are a, e, o, they are stressed. The vowels following are soft and brief. When the initial vowels are i, u, ü, the main vowels come after them. i, u, ü are transitional sounds. In Pinyin orthography some vowels are omitted for the sake of economy, for example i(o)u, u(e)i. However, when pronouncing these sounds, the vowels must not be omitted.

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Pinyin foundations

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