How to pronounce crash in American English

IPA /kræʃ/ Syllables 1 · krash Stress 1st syllable

KRASH

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Americans pronounce crash as KRASH (/kræʃ/). You'll hear it in sentences like "The social issue caused a crucial crash".

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Sound by sound

Every sound in "crash".

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.

r/r/

Curl or bunch your tongue without letting the tip touch the roof of your mouth. Brace the sides of your tongue against your upper back teeth, and round your lips slightly.

a/æ/

Drop the jaw noticeably. Keep the body of the tongue low and forward, and don't let the back of the tongue raise toward the soft palate. Pull the lip corners back slightly, almost a starting smile.

sh/ʃ/

Flare your lips and lift the mid-front tongue close to the roof of your mouth. Blow air through without voicing.

In real conversation

Hear "crash" in the wild.

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

"The social issue caused a crucial crash."

dhuh SOH·shuhl IH·shoo KAHZD uh KROO·shuhl KRASH

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Questions

Questions people ask about this.

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