Layer 2 · Finals (韵母)
41 finals — from simple vowels to nasal rimes
Finals are the "body" of a syllable, where the tone lives. Three classic traps: ü (say "ee" with rounded lips), ing/eng (they end in ng, not n) and ian (pronounced "yen"). Hear each final at both speeds and check the mouth shape before combining it on the matrix. Soft-gold cards mark finals that appear in common syllables — the same colour convention as the matrix.
Five groups of rimes
Learn finals by group, then combine them with initials
Start with simple vowels, then move to compound and nasal rimes. Click a sample syllable inside a card to open its dissection space.
ü — the "say ee with round lips" trick
Keep the tongue position of i (high tongue, tip low) but round your lips as if about to blow out a candle. If you hear yourself saying "oo", the tongue has slid back; if you hear "yoo", the lips opened too early. In Pinyin, ü is only written with its umlaut when it stands alone or follows n and l; after j, q, x and y it is written u but still pronounced ü — which is exactly why "ju, qu, xu, yu" sound nothing like "zhu, chu, shu".
er — the rime that stands alone
er never combines with an initial. It is a syllable of its own: start from a neutral "uh" and curl the tongue tip gently up towards the middle of the mouth without touching the roof. Learners tend to flatten it into "ar" or a plain "uh". It is also the rhotic suffix (儿化) of northern colloquial speech — getting used to it now will help you understand fast speech later.