Diphthong Sound /aʊ/

The /aʊ/ diphthong: from an open a into a rounded /ʊ/

The /aʊ/ starts just like /aɪ/ — mouth wide open — but glides backward while your lips round. It's the sound of surprise: wow. It shows up in very frequent words, so it's obvious when it comes out flat.

How it's made

• 👄 Mouth: open at the start, lips rounding by the end.
• 👅 Tongue: low and central at the start, pulling back and up at the end.
• 🔊 Voice: voiced and long, with the weight on the first part.

You hear it in: house · flower · down · now · about

⚠️ The typical Spanish-speaker mistake: not rounding the lips at the end, which leaves the diphthong half finished and pushes now toward na.

By the end you'll be able to: complete the movement all the way to the final rounding in words like house and down.