Tâi-gí Ear

A free phonology app for Taiwanese Hokkien (Tâi-gí)

Listen to selected words and sentences from Taiwan's Ministry of Education's Dictionary of Commonly Used Tâi-gí Vocabulary.

No affiliation with Taiwan's Ministry of Education.

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No account needed. Works in your browser.

The Approach

Minimal pairs

The app trains your ear through minimal pairs, two words that differ by a single sound. Study a set of minimal pairs, take a short quiz, and see exactly which sounds you're still mixing up. Use it alongside your other Tâi-gí learning materials.

The Coverage

What sounds you'll hear

i.
Initial consonants

pâ 爸 father; dad

bâ 麻 numb

Remember p has no puff of air (“spin”). b sounds similar, but it starts with a little hum.
ii.
Vowels and nasalization

hó 好 good; fine

hóo 虎 tiger; fierce person

For the o sound, the jaw is slightly closed and the lips are relaxed. For oo, the tongue is low and back in the mouth, and the lips are rounded.
iii.
Final consonants

tsi̍p 集 gather; collect

tsi̍t 一 one; whole

In English, you release a puff at the end of a word like “cap”. In Taigi, the ending is swallowed. Your mouth closes but doesn’t release. Listen for where it closes: -p closes at the lips, -t closes with the tongue behind the teeth.
iv.
Tones and tone sandhi

khí 起 to rise; to build

khì 去 to go; to leave

Two falling tones. The new one drops from high; the one you heard before drops from low.

Have a listen to the other sounds.

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Questions

Frequently asked

What romanization system does the app use?

Tâi-lô, the official romanization system adopted by Taiwan's Ministry of Education (MOE). It's the most widely used system for modern Tâi-gí learning.

Where does the content come from?

Audio, Tâi-lô romanization, Mandarin definitions, and word metadata from Taiwan's Ministry of Education Dictionary of Common Taiwanese Hokkien, freely available to download. Additional Mandarin definitions come from moedict.tw
English translations are derived from the MOE's Mandarin content using DeepL, Google Translate, Anthropic Claude AI or Google Gemini AI. Because of this, inaccuracies may be present.
Wikipedia and Wiktionary.

What about regional accents?

Tâi-gí has regional variation across Taiwan. The app uses MOE standard recordings as a consistent reference point. Real speakers you encounter may sound somewhat different.

Will my progress be saved?

Progress is saved locally in your browser. It will persist as long as you use the same browser and don't clear your site data. There are no accounts, and nothing is stored on a server.

Why did you make this?

I grew up hearing my parents speak Tâi-gí but never spoke it myself. Decades later I wanted to learn. I found that Taiwan's Ministry of Education had open-sourced a large amount of high-quality Tâi-gí data and wanted to help other English speakers trying to learn Tâi-gí.

Is this useful for heritage learners?

As someone who grew up listening to Tâi-gí, I've found it very helpful to isolate the sounds and pay attention to things that I never formally learned. I hope it will help you too.

What is Tâi-gí?

Tâi-gí (also written Taigi or Tâi-gú, and commonly called Taiwanese or Taiwanese Hokkien) is a language spoken by millions of people in Taiwan and in Taiwanese diaspora communities around the world. It's closely related to the Hokkien spoken in Fujian, China and by communities across Southeast Asia. Despite being widely spoken, Tâi-gí has few structured English learning resources compared to Mandarin.

How is Tâi-gí different from Mandarin?

Tâi-gí is a Southern Min language, part of the Hokkien family, and is not mutually intelligible with Mandarin. It has a different tonal system, different consonants and vowels, and distinct final consonants including short stopped endings not found in Mandarin. Someone fluent in Mandarin will not understand Tâi-gí without separate study.