Pronunciation · Science and learning

How to pronounce pneumonia

The p in pneumonia is silent: CMUdict gives noo-MOHN-yuh (N UW0 M OW1 N Y AH0) and a form with a lighter first vowel.

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The dictionary sound sequence

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

Dictionary variant 1

N UW0 M OW1 N Y AH0

Syllable estimate: 3 vowel nuclei
Primary stress: 2nd vowel position

Dictionary variant 2

N AH0 M OW1 N Y AH0

Syllable estimate: 3 vowel nuclei
Primary stress: 2nd vowel position

Check pneumonia 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 pneumonia in context

Health explainers, patient education and medical training audio name pneumonia often, and the pn spelling invites a sounded p. Both CMU forms begin with N, stress the second syllable and end in "yuh". The second form simply reduces the first vowel.

The doctor said the cough had turned into pneumonia.
Older adults are often offered a pneumonia vaccine.

Read the sound tokens

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

Nsound in kneeconsonant

UWsound in twovowel

Msound in meconsonant

OWsound in oatvowel

Ysound in yieldconsonant

AHsound in hutvowel

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 pneumonia

Word: pneumonia
Dictionary variant: 1 of 2
CMUdict ARPABET: N UW0 M OW1 N Y AH0
Vowel nuclei / estimated syllables: 3
Primary stress: 2nd vowel position

ORIGINAL AUDITION SCRIPT
The doctor said the cough had turned into pneumonia.
Older adults are often offered a pneumonia vaccine.

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.
[ ] Generate and listen to a short Murmur sample before exporting the full script.

Practice note: Begin the word directly on N. Read it inside a full medical sentence to make sure the "nyuh" ending is clear rather than blurred into the next word.

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/pneumonia

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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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