b/b/
Press your lips together, add vocal cord vibration, then release.
How to pronounce beads in American English
BEEDZ
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Americans pronounce beads as BEEDZ (/bidz/). You'll hear it in sentences like "Combine the blue beads with the black buttons" or "She makes her own jewelry using beads and silver wire" — more examples below.
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Sound by sound
Every sound in "beads".
1 syllable, 4 sounds. Explore each sound's mouth shape and how it's made.
ee/i/
Pull the corners of your lips back slightly. Arch the middle-front of your tongue high toward the roof of the mouth.
d/d/
Touch the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth just behind your teeth. Add vocal cord vibration as you release.
z/z/
Same position as S, but add vocal cord vibration. Feel the buzz.
In real conversation
Hear "beads" in the wild.
Click any sentence to see the full breakdown — every link, every reduction, every flap-T.
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Questions
Questions people ask about this.
Is the American pronunciation of "beads" different from British English?
American English uses different vowel shapes, a relaxed retroflex R, and connected-speech tricks like flap-T and glottal-stop T that British Received Pronunciation generally avoids. The respell "BEEDZ" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
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