How to Pronounce Nguyen? (CORRECTLY) Most Common Vietnamese Name Pronunciation

Listen and learn how to say Nguyen correctly (Nguyen Pronunciation, name from Vietnam) with Julien, "how do you pronounce" free pronunciation audio/video tutorials.

About the name Nguyen: Nguyen is the most common surname in Vietnam and among the top 100 last names in the United States, Australia, and France. Meaning "musical instrument" and actually rooted in Chinese, Nguyen is an interesting name that you'll encounter throughout the world. Alternate spellings include Nyguyen, Ruan, Yuen, and Yuan.
Famous People Named Nguyen
Damien Nguyen: U.S. actor
Scotty Nguyen: professional poker player
Dat Nguyen: U.S. football player
Nguyen Sinh Cung: Ho Chi Minh's birth name

Video Content (transcription):
We are looking at how to pronounce what is effectively the most common Vietnamese name, a very common name now found all around the world that has its origin in Vietnam. But how do you go about pronouncing it? Nguyen. Nguyen. If you want to fully understand how and why it is pronounced this way, there is a very detailed video explaining it, but it takes about 4 minutes to get through and finally understand in that video, so the short version is that you have to pronounce this name: Nguyen. Nguyen. Nguyen.

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[JavanHamiltonTV]

Per my professor, born in Vietnam, she Anglicizes it to “Win” like most people, but she pronounced it something like “nnn-gwen, ” with inflection on the “Ng.” Some also Anglicize it to “n’win” like news anchor Betty Nguyen. The name’s VERY common in New Orleans. Nguyen and Tran.

[ehs]

Everyone is banging on about how the pronunciation is wrong, but not a single person has taken the time to say how it's actually pronounced.

[winc]

Thiis is the third youtube by Vietnamese speakers with the same subject I have listened to this afternoon. All three pronunciations are markedly different. My only conclusion is that there are regional or class differences in how it is pronounced and that you will be wrong to someone no matter how you say it because everyone thinks they are the expert.

[nicolimbara]

here we are with several nguyen having arguments with each others

[khoakhoinguyen]

Can't even say how wrong he pronounced my last name. lol

[KailuaKid]

For those who have watched real new over the years, perhaps you can still hear the nightly news broadcaster talking about Nguyen Cau Ky, someone who ruled over South Vietnam during the war. It was consistantly pronounced: "WIN - Cow - Key". Those who migrated from Vietnam after the war adopted several western customs strictly for simplicity. 1) they took their family names (which were traditionally placed first) and moved it to the last position like other westerners do (if "Mao Zedong" had moved to the USA he would have swapped it as well and have gone by "Zedong Mao"). They do this to stop westerners from calling them by their last names, thinking it was their "given name", like "Tom, Dick, or Harry"... 2) many made it easier for westerners to pronounce their first names by changing their "vietnamese given names" to a common name given to a child in the host country they sought sanctuary, like "Michael" or "John" in lieu of "Cao" or "Ky"... and finally, 3) many Vietnamese ultimately acquiesced to their host country's population by adopting the way the majority of people mispronounced names in the community they took up residence. Yes, it will vary from state to state. Someone living in Oklahoma has adopted a different pronounciation of "Nguyen" than how it is prounced in Vietnam... "WIN". Someone who became a resident of New York adopted a different pronounciation than "WIN". Neither did so because they lived in different locales in Vietnam with different ways of pronouncing it, but simply accepted these little differences to make it easier for everyone else... as well as making it easier for themselves to fit in... which, if I do say so, think they have done quite well.

[adanacaccentcoaching]

This is being pronounced as Win by folks in North America, it could be a very anglicized version, but that's what they say. When there are sounds in a name that don't exist in a language, those sounds will be substituted by the closest sound available. In English, we never start a syllable with the -ng sound, we only finish on it, therefore most native speakers of English will not be able to initiate this sound in a word onset position.

[alpacamale]

in Cuba we know of Nguyen Van Troi. I even lived in a small neighborhood named after him but we never learned the correct way of pronouncing his name so we simply used the Spanish interpretation which is Guyén, leaving the N silent.

[REALIZME]

Seriously, no Vietnamese who do speak Vietnamese would ever pronounce this word the way you did 😂😂😂

[pawagner]

For crying out loud, just ask the Vietnamese person you are speaking to, on how to pronounce his/her name!!

[diceqube]

We don’t say no WANG. Nuu wiin. Is how I say it. It’s also my name so it hard for me to incorrect. But there are 2 version, the south and the north. Since I have it as a first name it’s kinda different. It’s also different with a hard accent. So this is a name that will never have a true pronunciation

[Runny]

i knew a vietnamese doctor with this last name who pronounced it slightly differently and I always just go with that. Had to make a call on a patient with this last name and wanted to be sure it was right lol

[Sillyguymandude]

"Hi Im Saul Goodman! Did you know that you have rights?"

[GiangNguyen-xplc]

as a Vietnamese, I confirm that u have pronounced Nguyen wrongly

[khoichau]

Native Vietnamese speaker here. This guy's not even Vietnamese and he's out here telling everyine the completely wrong pronunciation!

It doesn't matter whether its the northern accent, or the southern accent, or the central accent, this is not how you pronounce it!

He can't even get the pronunciation of the first two letters correct!

[its.dayday__]

I had a doctor at my clinic with this last name. She said it’s pronounced as “Win”

[nominis]

Literally every video on the internet on how to pronounce this has people going "That's not how you say it"

[thayquangenglish]

Appreciate your effort, but "Nguyen" is not considered a personal name in Vietnam. Instead, it's a family name and we never ever address a person by his/her family name.

[nguyenhongngoc]

Haha no Vietnamese pronounces like this :)))

[GraysonGibson]

This is wrong but there are tons of videos by Vietnamese people that tell you how to pronounce it correctly