A short vowel. The mouth is half open, the tongue is in the middle-front, and the lips are neutral. It is between /ɪ/ (more closed) and /æ/ (more open).
Hear it: /e/ · in a word: bed
How to make it
- Open your mouth a little more than for /ɪ/.
- Keep the jaw from dropping: that would turn it into /æ/.
- Keep it short and clean.
Spellings
| Spelling | Examples |
|---|---|
| e | bed, men, ten, pet |
| ea | head, bread, ready, health |
| ai | said, says |
| other | many, any, friend, guess |
Compare with /æ/
Open your mouth wider and drop your jaw for /æ/.
| /e/ | /æ/ |
|---|---|
| bed /e/ | bad /æ/ |
| men /e/ | man /æ/ |
| pen /e/ | pan /æ/ |
| set /e/ | sat /æ/ |
Practice
Drag each word to the vowel it has. On a phone, press and hold a word to drag it, or tap a word and then tap a box. Spelling can mislead you.
Words to sort: bed, ten, head, bread, said, many, friend, guess, bad, man, cat, black, hand, bag, happy, apple. /e/ as in bed; /æ/ as in bad.
Think about the sound, not the spelling. British pronunciation.
Press 🔊, listen, and choose what you heard. Press it again to hear it again. Each time you start, the sounds are different.
Press 🔊 to hear each sentence. There is no text: drag the word you hear into the gap. The bank has words that do not belong, so listen carefully. On a phone, press and hold a word to drag it, or tap a word and then tap the gap.
Press 🔊 to hear each sentence. There is no text: drag the word you hear into the gap. The bank has words that do not belong, so listen carefully. On a phone, press and hold a word to drag it, or tap a word and then tap the gap.