How to Pronounce the /i/ Sound 

How to Pronounce the /i/ Sound

In this lesson, we are going to learn how the sound /i/ is produced by looking at the articulatory organs.

What Type of Sound Is /i/?

/i/ is a long vowel sound as if you are saying "he," or "she."

How to Produce /i/?

ThumbnailPhoto

To produce it, as in the picture, open your mouth slightly, stretch apart the corner of your lips as you are smiling, and make the long /i/ sound. Notice that the lips are unrounded.

Which Letters are Pronounced as /i/?

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

ThumbnailPhoto

y:

Example

happy /ˈhæpi/

candy /ˈkændi/

i:

Example

police /pəˈliːs/

taxi /ˈtæk.si/

e:

Example

me /miː/

he /hiː/

Example

Barbie /ˈbɑɹbi/

thief /θiːf/

Example

three /θriː/

need /niːd/

Example

leave /liːv/

each /iːtʃ/

Example

ceiling /ˈsiːlɪŋ/

receipt /ɹɪˈsiːt/

Tip!

As you have seen before in the examples, When two dots come after the sound as in /iː/, It indicates that it is pronounced as a long vowel sound, not as a short or weak sound.

/i/ Around the World

As you see in the table below, all common languages around the world have this sound; therefore you will not have any problem producing it.

Existence

Example

Mandarin

李 (Lǐ)

Spanish

piso

Hindi

जीतना

Bengali

দিন

Portuguese

si

Russian

и́ли

Japanese

いる

Vietnamese

khi

Turkish

çivi

French

si

German

ihm

Italian

Persian

شیر

Standard Arabic

فی

Korean

흰색

Indonesian

ini

Filipino

sinat

Hungarian

visz

Dutch

diep

Polish

piwo

Romanian

mie

Swedish

sil

Czech

klít

Greek

ίδιος

Ukrainian

кіт

Urdu

جیتنا

Listening

Let us listen to the pronunciation of the /i/ sound which has been mentioned below:

0:00.00
0:00.00

Comments

(0)
Loading Recaptcha...
Share on :
books
Learn English VocabularyStart learning categorized English vocabulary on Langeek.
Click to start
LanGeek
Download LanGeek app