ㄴ — nieun
Korean consonant · /n/
ㄴ is /n/ — the n in no. It appears in 20 cells of the syllable chart, 11 of which have audio you can play here.
33 of the 568 words in the dictionary behind this site contain ㄴ — 23% of the bar the most common letter would fill.
| Name | nieun (니은) |
|---|---|
| Sound | /n/ |
| Romanized | n at the start, n at the end |
| Hear it | Recorded by a native Korean speaker |
ㄴ in the syllable chart
11 of 20 cells have audio — 10 with their own recording, 1 borrowing one from an identically pronounced syllable. 9 have none yet.
Where the reading differs from the spelling
- 녜 is read [녜/네] and romanized nye.
- 뇌 is read [뇌/눼] and romanized noe.
- 늬 is read [니] and romanized nui.
See the articles that decide this.
Words that use ㄴ
나라
country
나무
tree
나비
butterfly
- 나이age
- 누나older sister (of a male)
- 하나one
- 너무too much
- 누구who
Questions people ask
- How do you pronounce ㄴ? +
- ㄴ is /n/. In English terms it is the n in no. At the start of a syllable it is romanized n, and at the end of a syllable it is n.
- What is the name of the letter ㄴ? +
- It is called nieun (니은). Korean consonant names are built so that the letter appears twice — once at the start of the name and once at the end — which tells you both of its positions at a glance.
- How many strokes does ㄴ have? +
- 2. They are written top to bottom and left to right, the same order used for every Korean letter.
- Why is 녜 not read the way it is written? +
- 녜 is pronounced [녜/네]. 3 of the cells in this set read differently from how they are written. The rules page quotes the article that decides it.
- Why do some ㄴ cells play a different syllable? +
- 1 of them do. The standard defines those syllables as having the same pronunciation as another one, so rather than play nothing the cell plays that syllable's recording. Each cell names which one it borrows.