IPA

The IPA English help page on Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA/English is a great resource on IPA pronunciation. he notes here is based off that but with notes targeted to how I speak.

If you want to practice IPA, use a transcription service to convert normal text into IPA such as https://tophonetics.com/

Vowels

Vowels with words as I would say them. All vowels are voiced.

ɔː is used in RP. Eg. not /nɔt/ rhyming with ought while General American English pronounces this as /nɒt/. ɘ is called a schwa and has no jaw drop

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i least, the, cheese, cheek ɪ English ship, kit, mirror, edition	ʊ pull bull, shook, cook ʊː mood food	u to, Stunde, Uhr uː boot, Fuß
Mid Central vowels	eː way, may ɛ bed, air	ə ago, sofa ɜː certain, bird, burn	ʌ thumb up, fun, curry, un-prefix ɔ orange, born, sword paw, (rounded of ʌ) ɔː thought (RP), shore (RP)
Open	æ cat, trap, tattoo, ambition aː aye aː palm (RP), bra		ɒ thought (US, rhyme bot), lot, neon ɑ body, model, hot, start (rounded version of ɒ) ɑː card

Some vowels are combined, called diphthongs or triphthongs.

eɪ	a	/beɪ/, bay. eɪər player
ea		hair
aɪ	i	/baɪ/, buy. pie. aɪər, hire, aɪ.ər, higher
ɔɪ	a-oy	/bɔɪ/, boy. ɔɪ.ər employer helps with more of an O sound at the beginning.
əʊ	eau	/bəʊ/, beau, like oʊ but from farther back
aʊ	ow	/baʊ/, bough, bow (verb). aʊər flour. mouth, loud
oʊ	oh	goat, mower, home
juː	you	you
ɪr	ear	near, beer, deer, here
ɪə	e aah	dear (RP)
ɜr		square, care, fair
ɑr		part, large, marvelous, hearth
ɔr		north, for, war, horse, short, orchid, swarm
aɪr		fire, sapphire, liar, buyer
aʊr		tower, hour, flower, cower
ɔːr		war

Some subtleties between British and North American pronunciations are given in the table below. 'r's before vowels are hard?

Word	RP	General American
near	/ˈnɪər/ ne-ar	/'nʊər/ neer
cure	/ˈkjʊər/ cue-er	/'kjuːr/ queuer
square	/ˈskwɛər/	/ˈskwiːr/
caught	/'kɔːt/	/'kɒt'/

Consonants

IPA	Eample
b v	buy, cab
d v	dye, cad, ladder
dj	dew
dʒ v	giant, badge, joy
f	fan, leaf
g v	guy, bag
h	high, ahead
hw	whine
j v	yes, hallelujah
k	sky, crack
l v	lie, sly, gal
lj v	lute
m v	my, smile, cam
n v	nigh, snide, can
nj v	new
ŋ v	sang, sink, singer, song
p	pie, spy, cap
r v	rye, try, very
s	sigh, mass
sj	consume
ʃ	shy, cash, emotion
t	tie, sty, cat, latter
tj	tune
tʃ	china, catch, chair
ð v	thy, breathe, father ð is the voiced version of θ
θ	thigh, math
θj	enthuse
v v	vine /vaɪn/, leave, of /ʌv/
w v	wine, swine
z v	zoo, has
zj v	Zeus
ʒ v	pleasure, beige

Common Mistakes

Word	IPA	Incorrect and comment
mischievous	/'mɪs tʃə vəs/	/'mɪs tʃe ve ʌs/ (mis-che-vi-ous) with an extra syllable.
triathlon	/'traɪ'æθ lɒn/	/'traɪ'æθ a:lɒn/ (tri-ath-a-lon), with an extra syllable.
draught	/'dræft/	/'drɔ:t/ or /'draʊt/ (drawt). augh here is like an 'af'.
worcestershire	/'wʊstɘrʃɘr/	the first 'r' is dropped. 'shire' is like in New Hampshire and sounds like 'sure'.
hearth	/'hɑrθ/	/'hɜrθ/ like 'h' + 'earth'. Should sound like the first half of harp.

Accents

British greets with "hello love"

Received Pronunciation

Sound like a rich posh English person on the BBC.

• bath and path has an extra long 'a'. baah-th , paah-th.
• -ile endings are pronounced unlike North American. Eg. missile, fertile.
• 'r' sounds become 'a' like sounds; must be separated if not, and smoothed if it cannot be separated (-ire, -our)
  • ɪr becomes ɪə. beer, bee-ah. sincere, sincere-ah
  • ɜr becomes ɜə. care, caye-ah, fair, faye-ah.
  • ɑr becomes ɑː (super long a). part, paah-t.
  • ɒr needs to be separated. Awe: Orange (Or-range, awe-range). porridge (pour-ridge, pawe-ridge). or All: Dorothy (dor-rithy, dall-rithy), historical (his-tor-rical, his-tall-rical).

Cockney / Estuary

• th becomes f. three, free.
• 'l' becomes aw or w. milk, mil-ale-k. mail mawl..sdjf
• 'h' gets dropped. harry, 'arry. have, 'ave.
• t is a glottal stop. computer, compu'er.
• wales is 'wows'.

Midland / Northern

• cup of tea. cup becomes kuh-p .
• mug muh-g.
• up, uh-p
• love, luuv

Scottish

http://jackytappet.tripod.com/scots.htm