International Phonetic Alphabet sounds

The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabet for representing the precise pronunciation of words in all languages.

The English alphabet is not suitable for documenting the precise pronunciation of words in other languages. For starters, there are around 120 distinct consonant and vowel sounds found in languages world-wide (as you will see below). With only 26 letters available in the English alphabet, there is a need for a system that can represent sounds that aren’t found in English.

Even if your conlang only uses English sounds, English spelling is highly inconsistent: a single letter can have multiple different pronunciations (“so” vs “to“). Even if you were to say o is pronounced as in so, not to, this does not account for regional accents. Do not assume everyone speaks a General American accent!

The IPA addresses these problems by having unique symbols for every sound found around the world, and can even account for regional accents.

It’s important to know that Vulgarlang bases everything on IPA: when you are choosing the sound of your language, you are choosing the IPA sounds; when you create custom words for your language, you are writing the words in their pronounced IPA form.

Vulgar does also create a “spelling convention” for the language (which is the bold blue text) which can be controlled in the Spelling options.

Consonants

Click IPA symbols for audio

↓Manner/Place→BilabialLabio-
dental
DentalAlveolarPostalveolarRetroflexAlveolo-
palatal
PalatalVelarUvularPharyngealGlottal
Stop p English
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Swahili
Turkish
 b English
Arabic
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
    t English
Arabic
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
 d English
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
  ʈ Bengali
Hindi
Javanese
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Punjabi (India)
Somali
Tibetan
 ɖ Bengali
Hindi
Javanese
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Punjabi (India)
Somali
  c Bulgarian
Czech
Irish
Khmer
Latvian
Macedonian
Slovak
Tibetan
Vietnamese
 ɟ Corsican (France)
Friulian (Italy)
Irish
Latvian
Macedonian
Slovak
k English
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Swahili
Turkish
 g English
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
q Arabic
Chechen
Greenlandic
Inuit
Quechuan (Peru)
Somali
Uzbek
ǃXóõ (Botswana)
 ɢ Kwakʼwala (Canada)
Mongolian
Tabasaran (Russia)
ǃXóõ (Botswana)
ʡ Amis (Taiwan)
Archi (Russia)
Dahalo (Kenya)
ʔ Arabic
Burmese
Hawaiian
Hebrew
Nahuatl (Aztecs)
Pirahã (Amazonian)
Thai
Tibetan
Nasal m English
Arabic
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
ɱ Kukuya (Congo)   n English
Arabic
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
  ɳ Javanese
Norwegian
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Punjabi (India)
  ɲBasque
French
Italian
Javanese
Latvian
Somali
Polish
Portuguese
Spanish
ŋ English
Bengali
Chinese
Danish
Finnish
German
Indonesian
Irish
Korean
Norwegian
Punjabi (India)
Swahili
Thai
Uzbek
Vietnamese
ɴ Greenlandic
Japanese
Mapos Buang (Papua New Guinea)
   
Affricate       ʦ Catalan (Spain)
German
Hebrew
Luxembourgish
Navajo
Polish
Serbo-Croatian
Tibetan
Ukrainian
 ʣ Catalan (Spain)
Hungarian
Latvian
Polish
Ukrainian
ʧ English
Czech
German
Italian
Persian
Punjabi (India)
Spanish
 ʤ English
Arabic
Italian
Persian
Punjabi (India)
Ukrainian
  ʨ Korean
Russian
Serbo-Croatian
Thai
Tibetan
 ʥ Korean
Serbo-Croatian
Shixing (Tibet)
         
Fricative ɸ Bengali
Maori (New Zealand)
 β Hopi (North America)
Quechan (North America)
Sardinian (Italy)
f English
Arabic
Chinese
German
Greek
French
Hebrew
Hindi
Persian
Polish
Punjabi (India)
Russian
Spanish
 v English
Dutch
German
Greek
French
Hebrew
Hindi
Italian
Persian
Polish
Punjabi (India)
Russian
Turkish
θ English
Arabic
Greek
Hebrew
Spanish
Swahili
Welsh
 ð English
Albanian
Arabic
Greek
Spanish
Swahili
Welsh
s English
Arabic
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Spanish
Turkish
 z English
Arabic
Dutch
French
German
Japanese
Persian
Russian
Turkish
ʃ English
Albanian
Arabic
Bulgarian
Czech
French
German
Irish
Latvian
Persian
Portuguese
Punjabi (India)
Swahili
Yiddish
 ʒ English
Czech
French
Hungarian
Latvian
Macedonian
Navajo
Persian
Portuguese
Turkish
Ukrainian
ʂ Belarusian
Chinese
Faroese (Denmark)
Norwegian
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Polish
Russian
Tibetan
Vietnamese
 ʐ Belarusian
Polish
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Russian
ɕ Lithuanian
Lower Sorbian (Germany)
Polish
Russian
Swedish
Tibetan
 ʑ Adyghe (Russia)
Lithuanian
Lower Sorbian (Germany)
Kabardian (Turkey)
Polish
Russian
ç Irish
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Welsh
 ʝ Spanish
Scottish Gaelic
Pashto (Afghanistan)
x Arabic
Chinese
Czech
Dutch
German
Greek
Irish
Persian
Polish
Russian
Scottish Gaelic
Spanish
Vietnamese
 ɣ Arabic
Greek
Irish
Low German
Navajo
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Scottish Gaelic
Urdu (Pakistan)
χ Afrikaans
Arabic
Hebrew
Luxembourgish
Welsh
Yiddish
 ʁ Danish
French
Greenlandic
Hebrew
Inuit
Lakota (North America)
Luxembourgish
Portuguese
ħ Arabic
Hebrew
Kabardian (Turkey)
Kurdish
Maltese
ʕ Arabic
Hebrew
Kurdish
Somali
hEnglish
Arabic
Chinese
French
German
Hebrew
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Persian
 ɦ Afrikaans
Bengali
Hindi
Nepali
Punjabi (India)
Slovak
Approximant   ʋ Dutch
Finnish
Hawaiian
Hindi
Norwegian
Slovene
Urdu (Pakistan)
  ɹ Assamese (India)
Burmese
Faroese (Denmark)
Tibetan
Vietnamese
  ɻ Chinese
Tamil (India)
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Punjabi (India)
Warlpiri (Australia)
  j English
Arabic
Chinese
Dutch
French
German
Hebrew
Italian
Korean
Persian
Russian
Spanish
ɰ Cherokee
Guarani (Paraguay)
Tiwi (Australia)
   
Tap   Bana (Cameroon)
Mono (Congo)
  ɾ Hindi
Japanese
Persian
Scottish Gaelic
Spanish
Tagalog (Philippines)
  ɽ Bengali
Javanese
Pashto (Afghanistan)
Punjabi (India)
           
Trill ʙ Mangbetu (Congo)
Medumba (Cameroon)
Ninde (Vanuatu)
    r Arabic
Armenian
Czech
Finnish
Italian
Polish
Slovak
Spanish
Ukrainian
Welsh
          ʀ Luxembourgish
French (some dialects)
German
ʜ Aghul (Russia)
Chechen
Dahalo (Kenya)
ʢ Aghul (Russia)
 
Lateral fricative       ɬ Faroese (Denmark)
Inuit
Navajo
Welsh
Zulu
 ɮ Kabardian (Russia)
Mongolian
Zulu
               
Lateral approximant       lEnglish
Arabic
Filipino
Greek
Italian
Korean
Persian
Polish
Russian
  ɭJavanese
Norwegian
Tamil (India)
Warlpiri (Australia)
  ʎ Basque
Portuguese
Quechuan (Peru)
Slovak
Spanish
Tibetan
Turkish
Yiddish
ʟ Melpa (Papua New Guinea)
Wahgi (Papua New Guinea)
Yagaria (Papua New Guinea)
     
Lateral tap       ɺ Ache (Paraguay)
Cubeo (Colombia)
Wayuu (Colombia)
         

Coarticulated consonants

Non-pulmonic consonants

Vowels

a vs. ä

Many well known languages, such as Spanish and Italian, have the vowel ä. However this vowel very is often simply written as a, so long as the language doesn’t have true a, and so long as it is specified that a represents a “central low” vowel for the purpose of the document. This is a fairly normal practice among linguists, to avoid excessive diacritic usage. It may happen with other vowels, and even consonants, although it more common with vowels, and particularly common with this vowel.

IPA for English

Note: Diphthongs (vowels that are made up of two different vowel sounds) do not have their own dedicated audio recordings.

IPA examples
b but, web, rubble
ʧ chat, teach, nature
d dot, idea, nod
f fan, left, enough, photo
g get, bag
h ham
ʤ joy, agile, age
k cat, tack
l left
m man, animal, him
n note, ant, pan
ŋ singer, ring
p pen, spin, top, apple
ɹ run, very
s set, list, ice
ʃ ash, sure, ration
t ton, butt
θ thin, nothing, moth
ð this, father, clothe
v voice, navel
w wet
j yes
z zoo, quiz, rose
ʒ vision, treasure
IPA examples
British General American Canadian Australian New Zealand
ɑː ɑ ɒ ɐː father, palm
æ, a æ ɛ bad, cat, ran
æɹ ɛɹ, æɹ ɛɹ æɹ ɛɹ carry
eɪ, ɛi eɪ æe day, pain
ɑː ɑɹ ɐː arm, bard
ɛə, ɛː ɛɹ, eɹ ɛɹ eə hair, there
ɛ e bed
ɛɹ eɹ merry
i ease, see
ɪ ɪ, i ɘ sit, city, bit
ɪ i city, very, ready
ɪ̈, ɨ ə ɘ roses
ɪə, ɪː ɪɹ, iɹ ɪə, ɪː iə near, here, serious
aɪ, ɑi aɪ aɪ, ʌɪ ɑe my, rice
ɒ, ɔ ɑ ɒ ɔ ɒ, ɔ not, wasp
əʊ oʊ əʉ ɐʉ no, go, hope
ɔə, ɔː, oɹ, ɔɹ ɔɹ hoarse
ɔː, ɔ ɒ law, caught
ɔː, ɔɹ horse
ɔɪ, oi ɔɪ oe boy, noise
ʊ put, foot
ʊə, ɵː ʊɹ ʊə ʉə tour, tourism
u ʉː lose, soon, through
aʊ aʊ, ʌʊ æo house, now
ʌ ɐː run, enough, up
ɜː ɝ, əɹ ɝ ɜː ɵː fur, bird
ə ɘ about
ə ɚ ə ɘ winner, enter