English pronunciation guide
How to stress the right syllable in English words
Every English word of two or more syllables has one syllable that is louder, longer and higher than the others. Listeners use that stress to recognize words, so a word stressed in the wrong place can be harder to understand than one with a wrong vowel. The syllables around the stress shrink, usually to a schwa.
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Primary stress
Marked with ˈ before the syllable in IPA. That syllable is longer, louder and slightly higher.
PHOto, baNAna, COMfortable, deCIsion
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Secondary stress
Long words often have a lighter second stress earlier in the word, marked with ˌ.
underSTAND, photoGRAPHic, inforMAtion
How to make the sounds
- Look the word up once: dictionaries mark the stressed syllable with ˈ in the IPA.
- Make that syllable longer, louder and a little higher. Length matters most; shouting it does not help.
- Reduce the syllables around it. In ba-NA-na, both outer vowels are a short schwa.
- Learn the patterns below instead of memorising word by word.
Many two-syllable words that are both a noun and a verb move the stress: a REcord, to reCORD; a PREsent, to preSENT.
Words ending in -tion, -sion and -ic stress the syllable just before the ending: inforMAtion, deCIsion, ecoNOMic. Words ending in -ity, -ogy and -graphy stress the third syllable from the end: aBILity, biOLogy, phoTOGraphy.
Same word family, different stress
The first four pairs are spelled the same. In the last two, adding an ending moves the stress.
- REcord reCORD noun · verb
- PREsent preSENT noun · verb
- OBject obJECT noun · verb
- CONtract conTRACT noun · verb
- PHOtograph phoTOGrapher the stress moves
- eCONomy ecoNOMic the stress moves
Tricky words with these sounds: psychologyinterestingmischievoushyperboleepitomephotographerentrepreneur
Practice with real sentences
Tap Practice to open the sentence in Tono, listen to it, and say it. Scored against the US English model.
- Can you record a short message for me?Practice
- We bought her a present for her birthday.Practice
- Our photographer loves photography.Practice
- This information is really important.Practice
- The hotel room was very comfortable.Practice
- I understand the economic problem.Practice
- She has the ability to become a teacher.Practice
- It is possible that the results will improve.Practice
Common mistakes
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Stress on the last syllable
Common among speakers of French, where the end of a phrase is the strong part: comforTABle instead of COMfortable.
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Every syllable equally strong
Common among speakers of Spanish, Italian, Japanese and Mandarin. Without one clear strong syllable and weak ones around it, listeners lose the shape of the word.