IPA reference · consonant
ʁ — voiced uvular fricative
Voiced friction made between the tongue root and the uvula — the standard r of French, German and Danish.
Also called: French r, guttural r
How to make the voiced uvular fricative
Say "ah" and raise the back of the tongue toward the uvula until you get a light buzz. Practising after /ɡ/ helps, since /ɡ/ already puts the tongue in the neighbourhood.
This sound does not occur in standard English. That means there is no word you can say to find it by accident; you have to build it from the articulatory instruction above and check it against a recording.
Languages that use it
| Language | Example | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| French | rouge | red |
| German | rot | red |
| Hebrew | רחוב | street |
| Portuguese | carro | car (Brazilian) |
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 ʁ, and each one is a minimal-pair drill waiting to happen.
The English substitution; completely wrong place of articulation.
Over-correction — learners who know French r is "different" sometimes roll it instead.
What this means for learners
In German it vocalises after a vowel: *Vater* ends in a vowel-like /ɐ/, not a consonant. Learning that one rule fixes hundreds of words.
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 ʁ attached to the actual words they got wrong, not to an abstract chart.
Frequently asked questions
What sound does the IPA symbol ʁ make?
ʁ is the voiced uvular fricative. Voiced friction made between the tongue root and the uvula — the standard r of French, German and Danish. It does not occur in standard English.
How do you pronounce ʁ?
Say "ah" and raise the back of the tongue toward the uvula until you get a light buzz. Practising after /ɡ/ helps, since /ɡ/ already puts the tongue in the neighbourhood.
Which languages have the voiced uvular fricative?
Among the languages covered here: French (rouge, “red”); German (rot, “red”); Hebrew (רחוב, “street”); Portuguese (carro, “car (Brazilian)”).
What is the difference between ʁ and ɹ?
The English substitution; completely wrong place of articulation.