How to pronounce what's in American English

IPA /wɑts/ Syllables 1 · wahts Stress 1st syllable

WAHTS

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Americans pronounce what's as WAHTS (/wɑts/). In fast speech, the vowel in "what's" vanishes — the "ih" is completely elided, leaving only a quick "ts" cluster — this is a feature of casual, connected speech; in careful speech, the vowel is retained. This is called the Short Contractions (it's, that's), the casual shortcut native speakers reach for without thinking. It comes out as WAHTS. You'll hear it in sentences like "What's the plan for this weekend?" or "What's the price of that amazing prize?" — more examples below.

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Sound by sound

Every sound in "what's".

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

w/w/

Round your lips into a tight circle. Lift the back of your tongue toward the soft palate and add voice.

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.

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.

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

Hear "what's" in the wild.

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

"What's the best way to get downtown from here?"

WAHTS dhuh BEHST WAY tuh GEHT down·TOWN fruhm HEER

"What's the latest news on the situation?"

WUHTS dhuh LAY·duhst NOOZ ahn dhuh sih·choo·AY·shuhn

"What's the plan for this weekend?"

WAHTS dhuh PLAN fer dhihs WEE·kehnd

"What's the possibility of rain tomorrow afternoon?"

WUHTS dhuh pah·suh·BIH·luh·tee uhv RAYN tuh·MAH·roh af·ter·NOON

"What's the price of that amazing prize?"

WUHTS dhuh PRAHYS uhv dhat uh·MAY·zuhng PRAHYZ

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Questions

Questions people ask about this.

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