IPA Phonetic Symbols

The International Phonetic Alphabet — vowels, consonants, and stress marks with example sounds. Click any symbol to copy it instantly.

Illustration representing IPA Phonetic Symbols: Copy & Paste ə ʃ θ Pronunciation Characters.

IPA symbols from the International Phonetic Alphabet let you write pronunciation precisely — the schwa ə, the 'sh' sound ʃ, the 'th' sounds θ and ð, and dozens more. Typing them is the hard part: most keyboards have no way to enter IPA Extensions characters, which is why linguists, ESL teachers, and dictionary editors copy them from a reference like this one. Every symbol below is grouped by type and labeled with its name and an example sound where helpful.

Vowels

IPA Vowel Symbols

The vowel symbols most used in English and general phonetic transcription.

Schwa — 'a' in About
Small Capital I — 'i' in Kit
Open E (Epsilon) — 'e' in Dress
Ash — 'a' in Trap
Turned V — 'u' in Strut
Alpha — 'a' in Father
Turned Alpha — 'o' in Lot (British)
Open O — 'aw' in Thought
Upsilon — 'oo' in Foot
Reversed Open E — 'ur' in Nurse
Barred I — Close Central Vowel
Turned A — Near-Open Central Vowel
Fricatives

Fricative & Sibilant Consonants

The hissing and friction sounds — including the famous esh, ezh, theta, and eth.

Esh — 'sh' in Ship
Ezh — 's' in Vision
Theta — 'th' in Think
Eth — 'th' in This
Phi — Voiceless Bilabial Fricative
Beta — Voiced Bilabial Fricative
C with Cedilla — 'h' in Hue
X — 'ch' in Loch
Small Capital Inverted R — French R
Gamma — Voiced Velar Fricative
Other Consonants

Nasals, Taps & Other Consonants

Nasal, approximant, retroflex, and glottal consonant symbols.

Eng — 'ng' in Sing
N with Left Hook — 'ñ' in Señor
Turned R — 'r' in Red
R with Fishhook — 'tt' in American Butter
Glottal Stop — the Catch in 'Uh-Oh'
T with Retroflex Hook — Retroflex T
D with Tail — Retroflex D
Turned Y — 'gl' in Italian Famiglia
L with Middle Tilde — Dark L in Feel
Turned W — Voiceless 'wh' in Which
Stress & Length

Stress, Length & Modifier Marks

Suprasegmental marks for stress and vowel length, plus superscript modifiers.

Vertical Line — Primary Stress Mark
Low Vertical Line — Secondary Stress Mark
Triangular Colon — Long Vowel Mark
Half Triangular Colon — Half-Long Mark
Superscript H — Aspiration
Superscript W — Labialization
Superscript J — Palatalization
Superscript N — Nasal Release
Modifier Apostrophe — Ejective
Modifier Glottal Stop — Glottalization

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Related Resources

Greek Letter Symbols

Alpha to omega — Greek letters used in science and math.

Accent Marks & Diacritics

Acute, grave, umlaut, and other diacritical marks to copy.

Alt Codes

Keyboard Alt key codes for typing special characters.

Special Characters

A master list of special Unicode characters to copy.