تِلْفَاز
tilfāzmasculine
In Arabic, television is تِلْفَاز (tilfāz). Wiktionary also lists تِلِفِزْيُون (tilifizyūn) and جِهَاز تِلِفِزْيُون (jihāz tilifizyūn).
Meaning: device for receiving television signals (noun)
Ways to say it
| Arabic | Romanization (Wiktionary) | Note |
|---|---|---|
| تِلْفَاز | tilfāz | masculine |
| تِلِفِزْيُون | tilifizyūn | masculine |
| جِهَاز تِلِفِزْيُون | jihāz tilifizyūn | masculine |
The word refers to a device for receiving television signals.
Which one should you use?
تِلْفَاز is the standard term used in formal contexts like literature or news. In contrast, تِلِفِزْيُون is a phonetic loanword from English and is more frequent in daily spoken speech.
Is it said differently in some regions?
In Egyptian Arabic, تلفزيون is commonly used and many Egyptians may also use تى فى, which is derived from the English abbreviation 'TV'.
How do you pronounce it?
tilfāz
Did you know?
- The phrase صندوق العجب meaning 'box of wonders' was used colloquially in some regions to describe the television when it first arrived.
- Arabic uses a special 'weight' or pattern for تِلْفَاز that makes it sound like a traditional Arabic noun, effectively 'Arabizing' a foreign concept into a native grammatical structure.
- In some Arab countries, the term شاشة which literally means 'screen' is used as a synonym for the entire television set.
Examples in context
- أحب مشاهدة التلفاز في العطلة.I love watching television during the holidays.
- هَلْ هَذَا تِلْفَاز جَدِيدٌ؟hal hādhā tilfāzun jadīd?Is this a new television?
- أُرِيدُ شِرَاءَ تِلْفَازٍ صَغِيرٍ.urīdu shirā'a tilfāzin saghīr.I want to buy a small television.
Sources
- Wiktionary, “television” translations, CC BY-SA 4.0, dump of 2026-09-26.
