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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.
How to pronounce retake in American English
REE·tayk
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Americans pronounce retake as REE-tayk (/ˈriˌɾeɪk/). Stress falls on the first syllable — keep everything else short and quick. You'll hear it in sentences like "She improved her grade significantly on the retake examination".
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Sound by sound
Every sound in "retake".
2 syllables, 5 sounds. Tap a syllable to jump to its row, then 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.
t/t/
FlapQuickly bounce the front of your tongue against the roof of your mouth. Don't stop the airflow — just a quick tap.
ay/eɪ/
Start with your jaw slightly open and the front of your tongue forward and slightly up. Glide upward, your jaw closes a little more and your tongue arches higher toward the roof of the mouth.
k/k/
Raise the back of your tongue to touch the soft palate (velum). Stop the air, then release.
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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 REE — keep everything else short and quick.
ree·TAYK→REE·TAYK
Questions
Questions people ask about this.
How is "retake" stressed in American English?
Stress falls on the first syllable — say "REE" with a longer, fuller vowel and keep every other syllable short and quick. The respell "REE-tayk" marks the stressed syllable in capitals so the rhythm is easy to read at a glance.
Why doesn't the T sound like a T in "retake"?
In American English, when /t/ sits between two vowels with the second one unstressed, it turns into a quick D-like flap. So "retake" sounds closer to "REE-tayk" than to a crisp-T pronunciation. This is the flap-T rule, one of the most distinctive sounds of casual American speech.
Is the American pronunciation of "retake" 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 "REE-tayk" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
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