How to say jian

jian in its 3 tones, said in a female or a male voice. Tap a tone to hear it.

jian

Tap a tone to hear it; tap it again to hear it slower.

Voice

How to say it

j: The tongue tip rests behind the lower teeth and the front of the tongue presses the hard palate: close to the j in “jeep”, with no puff of air and no rounding of the lips.

ian: In ian the a sounds close to the e of “yen”, not the a of “father”.

Its tones

jiān 兼 to hold concurrently · jiǎn 减 to subtract · jiàn 件 classifier for clothes. jián isn’t used in standard Mandarin. The pinyin trainer practices telling them apart in real words.

Sounds near it

Learners often mix jian up with these. Listen to them one after the other.

Words with jian

The voices are generated speech (ElevenLabs), the same two the app’s word cards use, each tone said as one real word. The words are from the official HSK list (the exam’s 2025 syllabus), easiest first. Every syllable is on the pinyin chart.