How to Pronounce IPA Symbols

If you saw /ˌʌn.ɪnˈtɛl.ɪ.d͡ʒɪ.bəl/, how would you pronounce it? Learn how to read the IPA symbols we use in the Word of the Day emails.

I’ve been working on this one for a while! A handy reference for IPA pronunciation.

All the common modern, American English pronunciations are explained and defined on this page: b, d, dʒ, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, p, s, t, tʃ, u, v, w, z, æ, ð, ŋ, ɑ, ɔ, ɛ, ɪ, ɹ, ʃ, ʊ, ʒ, θ

IPA ≠ beer. IPA stands for the International Phonetic Alphabet—a globally-agreed upon set of symbols that describe pronunciation one sound at a time. Like the metric system, it's used all over the world, but for whatever reason, US-raised folk aren't taught it.

If you’ve ever puzzled over a school-book glossary, the difference will is immediately apparent:

• US glossary style: ZEE-bruh for zebra

• IPA: /ˈzi.brə/

• US glossary style: WUHT or WUT for what

• IPA style: /wʌt/

Those respellings lean on English spelling quirks (like EE for /i/, UH for /ʌ/ or /ə/), but cannot account for all sounds in English consistently, and different glossaries use slightly different pronunciation codes.

IPA eliminates this guesswork:

• One letter → one sound. /ʃ/ is always the “sh” in she, even in weird spellings like mission.

• Universal. The same /ʒ/ covers the “zh” sound in both measure and the French genre.

• Accent-aware. Write /ˈkɑɹ/ for an American car and /kɑː/ for a Londoner—no extra letters needed.

• You can learn something about your language. For example, a lot of people don't realize that English vowels that have one letter (for example, the word no in Standard American English) typically have two sounds not one. In the word no, there are first the 'o' sound, but it’s followed by a 'u' sound, which most people don't even think about. That's why in IPA notation, no is written /noʊ/, not /no/. (Compare with the Spanish "no," which has only one vowel and one sound.) Vowels with two sounds are called diphthongs. (See below for more examples.)

• No “weird exceptions.” English has sounds (like the schwa /ə/, the most common vowel in the language) that regular spelling can’t capture neatly. IPA gives each its own symbol, so sofa becomes /ˈsoʊ.fə/, not “SOE-fuh.”

• Wiktionary uses IPA exclusively. Wiktionary is an amazing language resource, and it often has information unavailable elsewhere. I use it regularly, along with a few other resources. Wiktionary uses only IPA pronunciations. (Note that Wikipedia will sometimes include the respelling pronunciation.)

Learn a handful of IPA symbols now, and you’ll zip through pronunciation—whether it’s for SAT words, Spanish verbs, or your next K-pop karaoke song.

IPA Cheatsheet for Word-Learners

This guide decodes the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) symbols you’ll see in my Word-of-the-Day posts so that you can pronounce each word confidently.

Scroll down for explanations of some pronunciation terms that you may not have heard before.

By convention, we wrap IPA pronunciations with slashes, like /ðɪs/ (“this”).

Core Consonants

Let's start with the easiest ones.

• /p/ as in pin – voiceless, lips together

• /b/ as in bin – voiced, lips together; notice that the difference between many consonants is simply whether they are voiced or not

• /t/ as in top – voiceless, tongue to teeth-ridge

• /d/ as in dog – voiced, tongue to teeth-ridge

• /k/ as in sky – voiceless, back of tongue to soft palate

• /g/ as in go – voiced, back of tongue to soft palate

• /f/ as in fan – voiceless, lip + teeth

• /v/ as in van – voiced, lip + teeth

• /s/ as in sip – voiceless hiss

• /z/ as in zip – voiced hiss

• /m/ as in man – nasal, lips together

• /n/ as in no – nasal, tongue to teeth-ridge

• /ŋ/ as in sing – nasal, back-of-tongue

• /h/ as in hat – breathy glide

• /ɹ/ as in run – American “r”

• /l/ as in lip – light “l”

• /j/ as in yes – the “y” sound; sometimes called a semi-vowel

• /w/ as in we – rounded glide; sometimes called a semi-vowel

Tricky Consonants

• /θ/ as in thin – voiceless “th”

• /ð/ as in this – voiced “th”

• /ʃ/ as in she – voiceless “sh”

• /ʒ/ as in Asia – voiced “zh”

• /tʃ/ as in chip – voiceless “ch”

• /dʒ/ as in jam – voiced “j”

Simple Vowels

• /i/ as in seat

• /ɪ/ as in sit

• /e/ (mid a in spay)

• /ɛ/ as in set

• /æ/ as in sat

• /ɑ/ as in father

• /ɔ/ as in law

• /ʊ/ as in foot

• /u/ as in goose

• /ʌ/ as in cup

• /ə/ (schwa) as in sofa

Diphthongs (Gliding Vowels)

• /eɪ/ as in face

• /aɪ/ as in price

• /ɔɪ/ as in choice

• /oʊ/ as in goat

• /aʊ/ as in mouth

Stress & Length Marks

• ˈ primary stress (appears before the stressed syllable)

• ˌ secondary stress

• ː lengthens the preceding sound (e.g., /iː/)

Tip: Learn these symbols a few at a time. There aren't that many, and they are pretty easy to remember.

Key Phonetic Terms

• Rhotic — Accents (like General American) that pronounce the /ɹ/ sound wherever the letter r appears, even at word-ends (car → /kɑɹ/). Non-rhotic accents drop that final r.

• Voiced — A sound produced with vocal-cord vibration. Touch your fingertip to your throat as you say /z/ or /b/; the buzz you feel is voicing; contrast those with the /s/ or /p/ sound.

• Voiceless — Made without vocal-cord vibration. Say /s/ or /p/; again, put your fingertip on your throat. It shouldn't vibrate, so the sound is voiceless.

• Fricative — A consonant created by forcing air through a narrow gap, producing friction: /f, v, θ, ð, s, z, ʃ, ʒ/.

• Plosive — Also called a “stop.” Airflow is completely blocked, then released in a burst: /p, b, t, d, k, g/.

• Liquid — A smooth, flowing consonant that allows air to escape around the tongue: English /l/ and /ɹ/ are liquids.

• Glide (also called semi-vowel) — A very brief, vowel-like consonant that “glides” into the following vowel. English has two: /j/ (the “y” in yes) and /w/ (the “w” in we).

Why I Use IPA Instead of “Dictionary-Style” Respelling

The short answer—when I taught English to non-native speakers abroad and in the US, I quickly discovered that literally none of my students understood the US dictionary style of pronunciation. Every single student used IPA, so I learned it to use that instead.

Also, in graduate school linguistics courses, I quickly saw that it was the standard way to codify pronunciation.

It really is a superior system, with a slight learning curve.

1 · IPA Beats the U.S. Dictionary System

• One symbol = one sound. IPA never swaps uh, ə, and uh again—each distinct vowel has its own symbol.

• Publisher-proof. Various glossaries, dictionaries included, all invent slightly different respellings; IPA stays the same in every book, app, or website.

• No accent bias. IPA captures any accent (British /ɑː/ vs. American /æ/) without forcing one to pretend the other doesn’t exist.

• Everything is covered. Need to show the “zh” in vision (/ʒ/) or the nasal “ng” in splitting (/ŋ/)? IPA has ready-made symbols; respelling systems fudge or omit them.

• Stress is obvious. Primary (ˈ) and secondary (ˌ) stress marks live right in the string, so you never guess which syllable to emphasize.

2 · Why the Rest of the World Already Uses IPA

• It’s lingua-franca friendly. English learners in France, Japan, or Brazil can share the same pronunciation key instead of deciphering “EE” or “IH” in American respellings.

• It works for every language. Linguists, actors, and singers annotate Spanish, Swahili, or Sanskrit with the same (or related) IPA symbols—glossary-style works only for English. Example: Some languages have different types of clicks, like "clucking" with your tongue. How to write this in English? You can't really. But IPA has it covered: /ǃ/ is for the alveolar click (there are five other click types).

• Academic gold standard. University linguistics, speech-therapy notes, and serious language textbooks all default to IPA for precision and clarity.

• Consistency saves time. Once you learn what /θ/ or /eɪ/ means, you never relearn it. Respelling forces students to re-decode each publisher’s private code.

• Digital-era durability. Unicode supports every IPA character, so your cheat sheet survives copy-pastes, fonts, and screen readers intact.

Bottom line: Mastering a handful of IPA symbols now pays off forever—no more head-scratching over strange respellings, whether you’re tackling SAT words or chatting with your polyglot friends across the globe.