How to Pronounce the /b/ Sound

bilabial sounds consonant sounds plosive sounds voiced sounds

In this lesson, we are going to focus on producing the /b/ sound and see what articulatory organs are used in the process.

What Type of Sound is /b/?

/b/ is a consonant sound in the English language.

How to Produce /b/?

As you can see in picture (a), in order to produce this sound, we put our lips together. However, as you can see in the picture (b), the teeth are slightly parted. So, we stop the airflow and the uvula blocks the air from coming out of the nose. So, we part our lips, releasing the air, resulting in the /b/ sound. As it is clear, this sound is produced from the mouth. Here, a little red circle in the throat shows the vocal cords. When it is red, it means that we use the vocal cords. So, the sound is voiced.
As you can see, in picture (c), the tongue does not touch anywhere and the voice is directly produced out of the lips.

Which Letters are Pronounced as /b/?

The sound /b/ is represented by the following letters:

Example

bike /bʌɪk/

bin /bɪn/

suburb /sʌb·ɜrb/

beautiful /bju·t̬ɪ·fəl/

bb:

Example

hobby /ˈhɑ.bi/

bubble /ˈbʌb.əl/

/b/ Sound in the Most Common World Languages

As you can see in the table below, the common world languages already have the /b/ sound. Although the sound may vary slightly in some languages. Look:

	Existence	Example
Mandarin*	✔	包 (bāo)
Spanish	✔	invertir
Hindi	✔	बाल
Bengali	✔	বই
Portuguese	✔	bato
Russian	✔	рыба
Japanese	✔	番 (ban)
Vietnamese	✔	bàn
Turkish	✔	bulut
French	✔	boue
German	✔	aber
Italian	✔	bile
Persian	✔	خوب
Standard Arabic	✔	باب
Korean	✔	지붕
Indonesian	✔	sebab
Filipino	✔	baboy
Hungarian	✔	baba
Dutch	✔	boer
Polish	✔	bas
Romanian	✔	bou
Swedish	✔	bra
Czech	✔	bota
Greek	✔	μπόχα
Ukrainian	✔	брат
Urdu	✔	بال

* The sound exists in the language, but the pronunciation may differ.

Listening

Below, there is an audio file that helps you learn the proper pronunciation of the /b/ sound:

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What Type of Sound is /b/?
How to Produce /b/?
Which Letters are Pronounced as /b/?
/b/ Sound in the Most Common World Languages
Listening

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