Pronunciation · Science and learning

How to pronounce aluminum

Aluminum in US English has four syllables, uh-LOO-muh-num (AH0 L UW1 M AH0 N AH0 M), with stress on "LOO" and no extra "ee".

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The dictionary sound sequence

CMUdict lists this North American English pronunciation for aluminum. Read each sequence from left to right. The numbers mark vowel stress: 1 primary, 2 secondary, 0 unstressed.

Dictionary variant 1

AH0 L UW1 M AH0 N AH0 M

Syllable estimate: 4 vowel nuclei
Primary stress: 2nd vowel position

Check aluminum in Merriam-Webster and listen to available dictionary audio.

Syllable counts come from vowel tokens; CMUdict does not supply syllable boundaries here. Variant order follows the dictionary and does not rank correctness. This lexicon does not represent every accent or context.

Use aluminum in context

Chemistry lessons, product specs and manufacturing videos all mention aluminum. The US spelling and the CMU entry give four syllables stressed on the second, which differs from the British spelling aluminium and its five-syllable reading. This page covers the US form only.

The case is machined from a single block of aluminum.
Recycle the aluminum cans in the blue bin.

Read the sound tokens

Each example word below is a cue for the named sound, rather than a respelling of aluminum. Unstressed vowels may sound reduced. These cues follow the CMU phoneme-set key (Appendix A).

AHsound in hutvowel

Lsound in leeconsonant

UWsound in twovowel

Msound in meconsonant

Nsound in kneeconsonant

Take it to your next recording

Make an audition worksheet

Select a dictionary variant for your checklist. The two original sentences retain their normal spelling; this worksheet helps you review a recording rather than forcing a speech engine to use phonemes.

Worksheet pronunciation variant

Your plain-text audition worksheet

How to pronounce aluminum

Word: aluminum
Dictionary variant: 1 of 1
CMUdict ARPABET: AH0 L UW1 M AH0 N AH0 M
Vowel nuclei / estimated syllables: 4
Primary stress: 2nd vowel position

ORIGINAL AUDITION SCRIPT
The case is machined from a single block of aluminum.
Recycle the aluminum cans in the blue bin.

REVIEW CHECKLIST
[ ] Read both sentences naturally; keep the source wording.
[ ] Compare the intended pronunciation with the selected dictionary variant.
[ ] Listen for vowel sounds, consonants, and word stress in context.
[ ] Check with a speaker or another dictionary when accent or meaning matters.
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Practice note: Say "LOO" with full weight and let the next two syllables stay short. If the script uses the British spelling, it calls for a different reading than this entry shows.

CMUdict is a North American English lexicon, not a recording or a complete accent guide.
Variant order is dictionary order; it is not a ranking of correctness.
Source: https://github.com/cmusphinx/cmudict/blob/74790861f652b15e4ac49015a90074ad62a27690/cmudict.dict
Source commit: 74790861f652b15e4ac49015a90074ad62a27690
License: https://www.murmurtts.com/downloads/cmudict-license.txt
Reference: https://www.murmurtts.com/pronunciation/aluminum

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Dictionary source

The phonemes on this page come from CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The dictionary maintainers acknowledge that errors and omissions can remain; check another source or a speaker when the pronunciation matters.

CMUdict README · Included dictionary license

Source version and checksum

Commit: 74790861f652b15e4ac49015a90074ad62a27690

Dictionary SHA-256: 81917843c7f44ce2b094ac63873c2c7a4cf802040792c455ba3ca406891c3d22

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