Skip to the word
Slova
Start learning
Menu

How to pronounce pneumonia

Pneumonia is pronounced noo-MOH-nyuh in American English and nyoo-MOH-nee-uh in British English. The p is silent, and the stress is on the second syllable, MOH.

Say it yourself
  • 3 syllables
  • Stress on MOH
  • US and UK IPA
  • Checked in Cambridge and Oxford

pneumonia

Three syllables, stress on the second

noun · a serious illness of the lungs, usually caused by an infection

  1. noonuː
  2. MOHmoʊ (stressed)
  3. nyuhnjə
  • US /nuːˈmoʊ.njə/noo-MOH-nyuh Recorded voice
  • UK /njuːˈməʊ.ni.ə/nyoo-MOH-nee-uh Your device’s voice

IPA checked in the Cambridge Dictionary and Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries. The recording is American English.

Pneumonia, sound by sound

Each sound in the IPA, with a word you already know that has it.

US American English/nuːˈmoʊ.njə/

  1. noo

    • /n/as in now
    • /uː/as in too

  2. MOHstressed

    • /m/as in man
    • /oʊ/as in go (US)

  3. nyuh

    • /n/as in now
    • /j/as in yes
    • /ə/as in about

UK British English/njuːˈməʊ.ni.ə/

  1. nyoo

    • /n/as in now
    • /j/as in yes
    • /uː/as in too

  2. MOHstressed

    • /m/as in man
    • /əʊ/as in go (UK)

  3. nee

    • /n/as in now
    • /i/as in happy

  4. uh

    • /ə/as in about

Say pneumonia yourself

Press the microphone and say it once. Your browser writes down what it hears: if it writes pneumonia, you were understood. If it writes another word, you see which sound changed.

Tip. The p is silent. Start with N: noo-MOH-nyuh (US) or nyoo-MOH-nee-uh (UK).

Record yourself and play it next to our recording: the quickest way to hear a difference.

Say it

Say this word

pneumonia

    Common pneumonia pronunciation mistakes

    What people often say instead, and how to fix it. Say noo-MOH-nyuh.

    • Notpuh-noo-MOH-nee-uh

      Saying the p. Start with a clean n.

    • NotNOO-moh-nee-uh

      Stressing the first syllable. The stress is on MOH.

    • Notnoo-MON-yuh

      Using a short o. The stressed vowel is the oh of go.

    Pneumonia in a sentence

    Hear each one, slow it down, then say it. Words change a little when they join others, so practise them in sentences too.

    • She went to hospital with pneumonia.

    • Pneumonia is an infection of the lungs.

    • He got pneumonia last winter.

    Is the p in pneumonia silent?

    Yes. The p is silent, so the word starts with an n sound. Pn is a spelling from Greek that English cannot say at the start of a word.

    The word comes from Greek pneumonia, from pneumon, which means lung. It is also the root of pneumatic, a tyre or tool filled with air. In Greek, people said both the p and the n. English kept the spelling and dropped the p.

    The stress is on MOH. British English says the ending as four syllables, nee-uh, and American English often joins them into one, nyuh. Start with n, say a long oo or yoo, and stress the second syllable.

    Words that sound like pneumonia

    Rhymes and words that share its tricky sound. Open any of them in the checker and say it.

    More words with silent letters

    All 170 difficult words

    Say words like pneumonia out loud with Slova

    In Slova you say new words out loud in every lesson, at your level, in lessons built around what you love.

    Start learning free
    All free tools