IPA reference · consonant
ð — voiced dental fricative
The voiced counterpart of /θ/.
Also called: eth, th sound (voiced)
How to make the voiced dental fricative
Identical tongue placement to /θ/ with the voice switched on. Put a finger on your throat — you should feel vibration.
English reference points: this, mother, breathe. If you speak English natively you already produce this sound — the work is recognising it and placing it where the target language wants it.
Languages that use it
Sounds it gets confused with
Most pronunciation errors are not random — they are a substitution of the nearest sound the speaker already owns. These are the usual substitutions for ð, and each one is a minimal-pair drill waiting to happen.
The most common substitution — "this" becomes "dis".
Common among French and German speakers.
What this means for learners
It appears in the highest-frequency words in English — the, this, that, they, there — so an error here is constant and highly noticeable.
Teaching this sound
Describing a sound in words gets a student roughly half the way there. The other half is hearing it produced correctly, immediately after producing it incorrectly, with both versions available to replay. That is the argument for recording during the lesson rather than after it: the student leaves with your model of ð attached to the actual words they got wrong, not to an abstract chart.
Frequently asked questions
What sound does the IPA symbol ð make?
ð is the voiced dental fricative. The voiced counterpart of /θ/. In English you can hear it in: this, mother, breathe.
How do you pronounce ð?
Identical tongue placement to /θ/ with the voice switched on. Put a finger on your throat — you should feel vibration.
Which languages have the voiced dental fricative?
Among the languages covered here: Greek (δέκα, “ten”); Spanish (nada, “nothing”); Danish (mad, “food (approx.)”).
What is the difference between ð and d?
The most common substitution — "this" becomes "dis".