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.
How to pronounce talking in American English
TAH·kuhng
Start here
Americans pronounce talking as TAH-kuhng (/ˈtɔkəŋ/). Stress falls on the first syllable — keep everything else short and quick. You'll hear it in sentences like "These are the ones I was talking about" or "He paused because he forgot what he was talking about" — more examples below.
Now you try.
Record yourself saying "talking" and play it back. The mic stays on your device — nothing's uploaded.
Sound by sound
Every sound in "talking".
2 syllables, 5 sounds. Tap a syllable to jump to its row, then explore each sound's mouth shape and how it's made.
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.
k/k/
Raise the back of your tongue to touch the soft palate (velum). Stop the air, then release.
uh/ʌ/
Relax your lips, jaw, and tongue completely. Drop your jaw slightly and keep the tongue neutral.
ng/ŋ/
Lift the back of your tongue to the soft palate. Lower your soft palate to let air flow through your nose.
In real conversation
Hear "talking" 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
"I feel so much better after talking things through with you."
ahy FEEL SOH muhch BEH·der AF·ter TAH·kuhng THIHNGZ throo wihth yoo
"I just started watching that new series everyone is talking about."
ahy juhst STAR·duhd WAH·chuhng dhuht noo SEER·eez EHV·ree·wuhn uhz TAH·kuhng uh·BOWT
"These are the ones I was talking about."
DHEEZ ar dhuh WUHNZ ahy wuhz TAH·kuhng uh·BOWT
Find another
Looking for a different word or sentence?
Search the entire library
/
Press / anywhere to focus the search box.
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 TAH — keep everything else short and quick.
tah·KUHNG→TAH·kuhng
02
Pronouncing the unstressed syllable too fully.
Don't pronounce the first syllable too fully. The unstressed syllable reduces to a schwa — the lazy "uh" sound — in casual speech.
TAH·KUHNG→TAH·kuhng
Questions
Questions people ask about this.
How is "talking" stressed in American English?
Stress falls on the first syllable — say "TAH" with a longer, fuller vowel and keep every other syllable short and quick. The respell "TAH-kuhng" marks the stressed syllable in capitals so the rhythm is easy to read at a glance.
Why does the second syllable in "talking" reduce to "uh"?
Unstressed syllables in American English collapse toward a schwa — a lazy, neutral "uh" sound. The full vowel is what textbooks teach, but in actual American speech every unstressed vowel reduces. The respell "TAH-kuhng" shows the reduced form so you can hear the casual rhythm directly.
Is the American pronunciation of "talking" 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 "TAH-kuhng" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
Stop reading about "talking". Start saying it.
SayWaader is the AI pronunciation coach for American English. Practice 5 minutes a day. Get a 5-axes accent assessment. Sound like you live here.