Let’s get started! There are 5 tones in Thai language – mid, low, high, rising and falling. In English, tones don’t have such a drastic impact on the meaning of words as in Thai. Thinking of such examples in English, only some interjections popped into my head. In these cases, it’s rather the emotion or reaction, that changes because of different tones. For example:

• Ooh – when you’re surprised / amazed
• Ooh – when see something painful or unpleasant

• Woohoo / Yay – when you’re actually excited
• Woohoo / Yay – when you’re being sarcastic

Based on intonation, you can also distinguish, whether someone is just stating a fact or asking a question / uptalking. For example:

• They moved to Thailand.
• They moved to THAILAND? 😮

5 Thai Tones

Thai Language Cards come with a card, that explains pronunciations and tones. In order to keep the cards compact, these explanations are quite brief and simplified. As one picture says more than a long boring text, we put together a more detailed illustrative graph of the five tones. And as the pronunciation of a native Thai says even more than a colorful graph, we added an example of each tone with its tone mark (that are also used on Language Cards) and pronunciation audio file. Crank up the volume and take a look at the graph.

Hopefully, the graph and examples helped you to get a better understanding of the five Thai tones and their differences.

Let us remind you, that you can grab Thai Language Cards with 20% discount until the end of February 2017! Just use coupon code “WordUp-Thai” during check-out.
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