The compound word ''chairo'' obviously comes from ''cha'' and ''iro'' so you
would think that the ''a'' and ''i'' would be pronounced separately. But
sometimes it sounds (to me) like they are pronounced as one sound similar to
the ''ai'' in the word ''hai''.

Are they pronounced both ways or just one ?
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pronunciation
Is chairo pronounced as both chai ro and cha iro?
It's 茶色{ちゃいろ}: ちゃ-い-ろ. And whether it is pronounced the same as how you
pronounce "chai" would depend on your native language. But the first two
vowels in the word 「茶色」are definitely not pronounced the same as the vowel in
the English words "light", "ride", or "pipe".

The /aɪ/ vowel in English, occurring in the words I listed above, is a
diphthong--a gliding vowel formed from long vowels in Middle English in [the
Great Vowel Shift](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Vowel_Shift). It is not
a /ɑ/ (how a lot of English speakers pronounce the vowel in "PALM") plus an
/ɪ/ (as in KIT). It is a single vowel, not a combination of two equal vowels
as is the case in Japanese. (Note: I am an American English speaker, so I am
basing most things here on [General American
(GA)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_American_English), but [Receive
Pronunciation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation) is also
included in this answer, but there are varieties of English where the vowel in
bath is rendered the same as the /a/ in /aɪ/.)

Diphthongs are single vowels with some tongue movement that allows a
transition in the rendition of the vowel. Modern Japanese doesn't have
diphthongs. Japanese is phonetically codified through kana and rendered in
distinct syllables that largely follow the consonant-vowel pattern, with each
vowel having the same
[length](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Length_\(phonetics\)) (which means all
syllables are pronounced with roughly similar durations). So the simple answer
to your question is: no, it is not pronounced the same way in English.
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Imagine if you were an English speaker, asked by a Japanese that: "Should I
pronounce 'header' as ヘダー or ヘッダー?"

From a native speaker's standpoint, it is actually a non-problem: ちゃいろ is
always in three units
([morae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mora_\(linguistics\))) _cha-i-ro_. The
fact is not affected by word composition either, as バイト "part-time job" is
always _ba-i-to_ too. (And はい _ha-i_.)

So what leads to your question is, I think, in fact the mismatch between the
Japanese tongue and [your native language]'s ear. In every language, fast (I
mean, most of the daily) speech compromises on phonological clearness for
articulatory smoothness; which means in this case, the hiatus _a-i_ becomes so
seamless that many incidental factors such as relative length of _a_ to _i_ ,
emphasis, or surrounding intonation etc. could make you sometimes hear the
diphthong //ai// and other times not. It is hard to make a generalized advice
on this because it also depends on your language's threshold when to hear
//ai// and ⁠//a.i// as syllables.

Either way, no matter whether you believe that "chai-ro" and "cha-iro" are
distinct sounds uttered in separate manners, it is just an irrelevant matter
of where you accidentally put more muscle for Japanese speakers. The correct
way I think is to train yourself to utter cha / i / ro each in same length by
default (i.e. when no stress or intonation is in consideration).
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Count (uniformly) 3 beats: 1(cha)2(i)3(ro). Pronounce it in one continuous
flow. (Do not break in between cha and i, or in between i and ro.)

There is not a standalone vowel “ai”. For instance, 愛する takes 4 beats (mora):
1(a)2(i)3(su)4(ru). Pronouncing it in 3 beats as 1(ai)2(su)3(ru) would be
incorrect. Likewise はい takes two beats (but in one continuous flow).
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