ماذا يعني هذا؟

• ماذا = what
• يعني = it means / he means
• هذا = this

Word-for-word, the sentence is something like What means this?, but in natural English it means What does this mean?

يعني is the imperfect/present-tense form of the verb عَنَى / يَعْنِي, which means to mean.

In this sentence, يعني is in the 3rd person masculine singular form, literally it means or he means.

Arabic often uses this form when the subject is something like this, that, the word, the sentence, and so on. So:

• ماذا يعني هذا؟ = What does this mean?
• literally: What does this mean? / What means this?

هذا is the masculine singular demonstrative, meaning this.

It is used because the thing being referred to is treated as masculine singular. In Arabic, nouns have grammatical gender, so if the implied noun is masculine, you use هذا.

For example:

• هذا الكتاب = this book (book is masculine)
• هذا المصطلح = this term
• هذا ماذا يعني؟ would be less standard than ماذا يعني هذا؟, but هذا is still masculine singular

If the thing were feminine, you would usually use هذه instead:

• ماذا تعني هذه؟ = What does this mean? (referring to a feminine noun)

The verb agrees with the subject, which here is هذا.

Since هذا is masculine singular, the verb is also masculine singular:

• هذا يعني = this means

If the subject changed, the verb would change too:

• هذه تعني = this (feminine) means
• هذان يعنيان = these two mean
• هؤلاء يعنون = these mean (for rational masculine plural, though this exact structure is less common in simple learner examples)

So in ماذا يعني هذا؟, the grammar is matching correctly.

ماذا is the question word what?, and in Arabic question words often come at the beginning of the sentence.

So:

• ماذا يعني هذا؟ = What does this mean?

This is the normal and natural word order for this type of question in MSA.

Both ما and ماذا can relate to what, but ماذا is especially common in direct questions like this.

So:

• ماذا يعني هذا؟ = very natural, standard
• ما معنى هذا؟ = also very common, but structurally different: What is the meaning of this?

You may also see ما هذا؟ meaning What is this?, which is a different question.

So for What does this mean?, ماذا يعني هذا؟ is a very natural choice.

Usually, no. In ماذا يعني هذا؟, the most natural reading is What does this mean?

That is because هذا is functioning as the subject: this means.

If you want to say What does he mean by this?, Arabic would normally phrase it differently, such as:

• ماذا يعني بهذا؟
• literally: What does he mean by this?

So the position and role of هذا matter.

Arabic does not use a separate helping verb like English do/does in ordinary present-tense questions.

English:

• What does this mean?

Arabic:

• ماذا يعني هذا؟
• literally closer to: What means this?

The idea of does is simply part of how English forms questions. Arabic does not need an extra word for that here.

A careful MSA pronunciation is approximately:

mādhā yaʿnī hādhā?

A rough guide for English speakers:

• mādhā = maa-thaa (but th here is like in this, not thin)
• yaʿnī = yaʕ-nee
  
  • the ʿ represents the Arabic letter ع, a sound English does not have
• hādhā = haa-thaa (again with th as in this)

One important note: the ذ sound in ماذا and هذا is like th in this, not like z in careful MSA pronunciation.

The word يعني contains the letter ع in its root. The root is ع ن ي.

The sound ع is difficult for many English speakers. It is a voiced pharyngeal sound, produced deep in the throat. If you cannot pronounce it perfectly yet, that is very normal.

In learning stages, many students approximate:

• yaʿnī as something like ya-nee

But it is worth training yourself to hear and eventually pronounce ع, because it is an important Arabic consonant.

It is a verbal sentence, because it is built around the verb يعني.

Structure:

• ماذا = question word
• يعني = verb
• هذا = subject

So the core statement behind the question is:

• هذا يعني ... = This means ...

When turned into a question with ماذا, it becomes:

• ماذا يعني هذا؟

Yes. A very common alternative is:

• ما معنى هذا؟

This literally means:

• What is the meaning of this?

Both are common and correct:

• ماذا يعني هذا؟
• ما معنى هذا؟

The second one may feel slightly more straightforward for beginners because it uses the noun معنى (meaning) instead of the verb يعني (means).

It works well in Modern Standard Arabic and is completely normal in formal Arabic, writing, education, subtitles, news-style Arabic, and textbook Arabic.

In everyday spoken Arabic, dialects often use other forms. For example, many dialects prefer expressions equivalent to:

• What does this mean?
• What does that mean?

So ماذا يعني هذا؟ is definitely correct and useful, especially for MSA, but the exact everyday spoken version depends on the dialect.