How to pronounce clues in American English

IPA /kluz/ Syllables 1 · klooz Stress 1st syllable

KLOOZ

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Americans pronounce clues as KLOOZ (/kluz/). You'll hear it in sentences like "Detectives are investigating the crime scene for clues" or "He uses context clues to guess the meaning of unknown words" — more examples below.

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Sound by sound

Every sound in "clues".

1 syllable, 4 sounds. Explore each sound's mouth shape and how it's made.

k/k/

Raise the back of your tongue to touch the soft palate (velum). Stop the air, then release.

l/l/

Place the tip of your tongue against the alveolar ridge just behind your top front teeth, the same contact point as /t/, /d/, and /n/. The difference is what happens to the air: for /l/, you let it flow continuously around the <em>sides</em> of the tongue (that's why /l/ is called a lateral). Turn your voice on the whole time. Lips stay relaxed, no rounding or flaring. For the Dark L variant at the end of a syllable, also pull the back of the tongue up and back toward the soft palate.

oo/u/

Round your lips into a tight circle. Let your tongue rest in the middle of your mouth, slightly raised.

z/z/

Same position as S, but add vocal cord vibration. Feel the buzz.

In real conversation

Hear "clues" in the wild.

Click any sentence to see the full breakdown — every link, every reduction, every flap-T.

"Detectives are investigating the crime scene for clues."

duh·TEHK·tuhvz er ihn·VEH·stuh·gay·duhng dhuh KRAHYM SEEN fer KLOOZ

"He uses context clues to guess the meaning of unknown words."

hee YOO·zuhz KAHN·tehkst KLOOZ tuh GEHS dhuh MEE·nuhng uhv uhn·NOHN WURDZ

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Questions

Questions people ask about this.

Is the American pronunciation of "clues" 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 "KLOOZ" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.