---
title: "How to pronounce caveat | Murmur"
description: "Caveat has three syllables in CMUdict, KAY-vee-at (K EY1 V IY0 AE2 T), stressed on the first, with the final t sounded."
canonical: "https://www.murmurtts.com/pronunciation/caveat"
---
[Murmur](https://www.murmurtts.com/)/[Pronunciation](https://www.murmurtts.com/pronunciation)/caveat

Pronunciation · Work and business

# How to pronounce caveat

Caveat has three syllables in CMUdict, KAY-vee-at (K EY1 V IY0 AE2 T), stressed on the first, with the final t sounded.

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## The dictionary sound sequence

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

Dictionary variant 1

`K EY1 V IY0 AE2 T`

**Syllable estimate**

3 vowel nuclei

**Primary stress**

1st vowel position

**Secondary stress**

3rd vowel position

[Check caveat in Merriam-Webster and listen to available dictionary audio](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/caveat).

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 caveat in context

Caveat comes up in contracts, analyst notes and meeting talk, as in "one caveat". Readers sometimes squeeze it into two syllables, "kav-yat". The entry keeps three beats and ends on a clear t.

1. One caveat: the numbers exclude the holiday quarter.
2. The offer came with a caveat about early cancellation.

### A practice cue

Say kay, vee and at separately, then join them without dropping the middle vowel. Read the first example at meeting pace to check all three beats survive.

## Read the sound tokens

Each example word below is a cue for the named sound, rather than a respelling of caveat. Unstressed vowels may sound reduced. These cues follow the [CMU phoneme-set key (Appendix A)](https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~aria/Papers/MastersThesis.pdf#page=115).

`K`sound in **key**consonant`EY`sound in **ate**vowel`V`sound in **vee**consonant`IY`sound in **eat**vowel`AE`sound in **at**vowel`T`sound in **tea**consonant

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## Dictionary source

The phonemes on this page come from [CMU Pronouncing Dictionary](https://github.com/cmusphinx/cmudict/blob/74790861f652b15e4ac49015a90074ad62a27690/cmudict.dict). The dictionary maintainers acknowledge that errors and omissions can remain; check another source or a speaker when the pronunciation matters.

[CMUdict README](https://github.com/cmusphinx/cmudict/blob/74790861f652b15e4ac49015a90074ad62a27690/README) · [Included dictionary license](https://www.murmurtts.com/downloads/cmudict-license.txt)

Source version and checksum

Commit: `74790861f652b15e4ac49015a90074ad62a27690`

Dictionary SHA-256: `81917843c7f44ce2b094ac63873c2c7a4cf802040792c455ba3ca406891c3d22`

## Keep practising

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