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How to pronounce 理由

How to pronounce

in Mandarin Chinese

lǐ理yóu由

reason; grounds

HSK 5

Synthesized Mandarin audio · Vivian voice

lǐThird toneyóuSecond tone

Hear it in conversation

Dashu Mandarin 大叔中文Watch on YouTube ↗

Select a word for its meaning.

See it in a sentence.

。

Your reason is very good.

。

You have good reason to be angry.

。

There's no reason to be afraid.

Hear the difference

A syllable has a shape.

Tone marks show how pitch changes. Colors help you follow each syllable in the app.

ā First toneHigh and level
á Second toneRising
ǎ Third toneLow, then rising in isolation
à Fourth toneFalling
a Neutral toneShort and light

These are dictionary tones. In natural speech, tones can change with context. A third tone often stays low before another syllable.

Dictionary and example sources

Definitions adapt CC-CEDICT through HSK 3.0, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Definitions are shortened for study.

Examples include Lock In original sentences and the Tatoeba Project, under CC BY 2.0 France. Chinese text is normalized to simplified characters. Pinyin follows the study dictionary.