Shangri Lingua

How to say “car” in Thai

รถ

rót

/rót/

รถ means car, vehicle.

Pronunciation and usage

Tone: high

This covers cars and most other wheeled vehicles: รถเมล์ (rót may) is a bus and รถไฟ (rót fai) is a train.

Reading the romanization: the mark over a vowel shows its tone. bp and dt are a p and a t with no puff of air, while plain p, t and k have the puff. The IPA shows the exact sounds, and Learn the IPA explains how to read it.

Examples

  • รถคันนี้เก่ามาก

    rót kan née gào mâak/rót kʰan níː kàw mâːk/

    This car is very old.

How it’s spelled

Thai is written in a fixed order, which isn’t always the order you hear. Here’s each letter of รถ in the order you’d write it.

  • ร

    “r” starts the word.

    ro ruea, from เรือ (boat)Low class

    A wavy flag across the top, a drop down the right, and a small loop at the bottom.

  • ถ

    “t” ends the word.

    tho thung, from ถุง (sack)High class

    An arch with a small loop inside the foot of the left leg. Compare ภ, whose loop is outside.

No vowel is written here: two consonants with nothing between them get a short “o”.

Why the tone is high

  1. It starts with ร, which is low class.
  2. There’s no tone mark, so the kind of syllable decides.
  3. It ends in “t”, a sound that stops short, so the syllable is dead.
  4. Low class and dead depends on the vowel too. This one is short, which gives a high tone.

New to consonant classes and live or dead syllables? See how Thai tones work.

Learn to write it

The Shangri Lingua app teaches รถ in its Thai writing course. You write the word one letter at a time, with your finger or Apple Pencil, and the app checks each letter and gives you more help if you get stuck. Get it on the App Store.

More places and things

Browse all Thai vocabulary.