Pinyin practice: the four Mandarin tones

Original Chinese study material with English explanations. Simplified Chinese with pinyin; beginner, intermediate and advanced are editorial difficulty labels.

Pinyin represents pronunciation with Roman letters and tone marks. Practise a high level first tone (mā), rising second tone (má), low third tone (mǎ) and falling fourth tone (mà). A neutral-tone syllable has no tone mark and is usually shorter. The third tone often stays low in connected speech rather than making a full dip and rise.

妈、麻、马、骂

mā, má, mǎ, mà

mother; hemp; horse; scold

你好。你好吗？

Nǐ hǎo. Nǐ hǎo ma?

Hello. How are you?

Before another third tone, a third tone is normally pronounced like a second tone: nǐ hǎo is spoken ní hǎo. Pinyin commonly retains the underlying third-tone spelling. Device speech is a listening aid, not a pronunciation score.

Try it

Which pinyin spelling has the fourth tone?

1. mǎ
2. má
3. mà

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