f/f/
Lift your bottom lip to touch the very bottom of your top front teeth. Blow air through this contact point without voicing.
How to pronounce frizzy in American English
FRIH·zee
Start here
Americans pronounce frizzy as FRIH-zee (/ˈfrɪzi/). Stress falls on the first syllable — keep everything else short and quick.
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Sound by sound
Every sound in "frizzy".
2 syllables, 5 sounds. Tap a syllable to jump to its row, then explore each sound's mouth shape and how it's made.
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.
ih/ɪ/
Drop your jaw slightly with relaxed lips. Touch the tongue tip behind the bottom front teeth and arch the top-front toward the roof.
z/z/
Same position as S, but add vocal cord vibration. Feel the buzz.
ee/i/
Pull the corners of your lips back slightly. Arch the middle-front of your tongue high toward the roof of the mouth.
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Watch out
Common pronunciation mistakes in American English.
The textbook way isn't wrong — it's just not how anyone actually says it.
01
Stressing the wrong syllable.
Stress falls on the first syllable, not the others. Stretch FRIH — keep everything else short and quick.
frih·ZEE→FRIH·zee
Questions
Questions people ask about this.
How is "frizzy" stressed in American English?
Stress falls on the first syllable — say "FRIH" with a longer, fuller vowel and keep every other syllable short and quick. The respell "FRIH-zee" marks the stressed syllable in capitals so the rhythm is easy to read at a glance.
Is the American pronunciation of "frizzy" 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 "FRIH-zee" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
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