How to pronounce ships in American English

IPA /ʃɪps/ Syllables 1 · shihps

shihps

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Americans pronounce ships as shihps (/ʃɪps/). You'll hear it in sentences like "The coastline is rugged and dangerous for ships".

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Sound by sound

Every sound in "ships".

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

sh/ʃ/

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

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.

p/p/

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

s/s/

Place your tongue tip near the roof of your mouth behind your top teeth. Push air through the narrow gap. No voicing.

In real conversation

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

"The coastline is rugged and dangerous for ships."

dhuh KOHST·lahyn ihz RUH·guhd and DAYN·jer·uhs fer shihps

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Questions

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