s/s/
Place your tongue tip near the roof of your mouth behind your top teeth. Push air through the narrow gap. No voicing.
How to pronounce star in American English
STAR
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Americans pronounce star as STAR (/stɑr/). You'll hear it in sentences like "I saw a large star" or "The star is far away" — more examples below.
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Sound by sound
Every sound in "star".
1 syllable, 3 sounds. Explore each sound's mouth shape and how it's made.
t/t/
Touch the tip or front edge of your tongue to the roof of your mouth just behind your teeth. Keep your jaw relaxed. Stop the air, then release with a puff.
ar/ɑr/
Open wide for the 'ah' vowel. Lift the tongue back and up while flaring the lips for the 'r'.
In real conversation
Hear "star" in the wild.
Click any sentence to see the full breakdown — every link, every reduction, every flap-T.
"A supernova is the powerful explosion of a dying star."
uh soo·per·NOH·vuh ihz dhuh POW·er·fuhl uhk·SPLOH·zhuhn uhv uh DAHY·uhng STAR
"I saw a large star."
ahy SAH uh LARJ STAR
"The star is far away."
dhuh STAR ihz FAR uh·WAY
"The star is a massive ball of hot plasma."
dhuh STAR ihz uh MA·suhv BAHL uhv HAHT PLAZ·muh
"The artist carved a star into the hard marble."
dhee AR·tuhst KARVD uh STAR IHN·tuh dhuh HARD MAR·buhl
"The star is far from the hard part."
dhuh STAR ihz FAR fruhm dhuh HARD PART
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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
Pronouncing the "R" too clearly.
Americans use a relaxed retroflex R — the tongue curls back rather than rolling. The R is one continuous sound with the vowel before it, not two separate sounds.
… (no R)→… r (curl the tongue)
Questions
Questions people ask about this.
How do I pronounce the R in "star"?
Americans use a relaxed retroflex R: the tongue curls back rather than rolling, and the R is one continuous sound with the vowel before it — not two separate sounds. Don't try to pronounce a separate vowel followed by a separate R. Treat them as a single shape.
Is the American pronunciation of "star" 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 "STAR" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
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