How to pronounce paused in American English

IPA /pɑzd/ Syllables 1 · pahzd Stress 1st syllable

PAHZD

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Americans pronounce paused as PAHZD (/pɑzd/). You'll hear it in sentences like "He paused because he forgot what he was talking about".

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Sound by sound

Every sound in "paused".

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

p/p/

Press your lips together to stop the air, then release. No vocal cord vibration.

ah/ɑ/

Relax your lips and drop your jaw significantly. The tongue tip lightly touches behind the bottom front teeth and the back part of the tongue presses down a little to create more dark space in the back of the mouth.

z/z/

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

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.

In real conversation

Hear "paused" in the wild.

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

"He paused because he forgot what he was talking about."

hee PAHZD buh·KUHZ hee fer·GAHT wuht hee wuhz TAH·kuhng uh·BOWT

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Questions

Questions people ask about this.

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