PRONUNCIATION / Science and learning

How to pronounce reservoir

Check reservoir pronunciation with CMUdict sound tokens and stress, then practise two original sentences and download a voiceover audition worksheet.

The dictionary sound sequence

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

Dictionary variant 1

R EH1 Z AH0 V W AA2 R

Syllable estimate: 3 vowel nuclei
Primary stress: 1st vowel position
Secondary stress: 3rd vowel position

Dictionary variant 2

R EH1 Z ER0 V W AA2 R

Syllable estimate: 3 vowel nuclei
Primary stress: 1st vowel position
Secondary stress: 3rd vowel position

Check reservoir 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 reservoir in context

Reservoir commonly describes a place where water is stored, and it can also describe a stored supply of another resource. Geography lessons, infrastructure reports, and metaphorical narration use different senses. Establish what is being held and why that supply matters before introducing measurements or discussing how it is managed.

The reservoir supplies water to several nearby towns.
The old notebooks became a reservoir of ideas for the next collection.

Read the sound tokens

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

Rsound in readconsonant

EHsound in Edvowel

Zsound in zeeconsonant

AHsound in hutvowel

Vsound in veeconsonant

Wsound in weconsonant

AAsound in oddvowel

ERsound in hurtvowel

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 reservoir

Word: reservoir
Dictionary variant: 1 of 2
CMUdict ARPABET: R EH1 Z AH0 V W AA2 R
Vowel nuclei / estimated syllables: 3
Primary stress: 1st vowel position

ORIGINAL AUDITION SCRIPT
The reservoir supplies water to several nearby towns.
The old notebooks became a reservoir of ideas for the next collection.

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: Compare reservoir in the geographical description and the metaphor from your project. Listen to the phrase naming the stored resource, then check whether any nearby place names or measurements need separate auditions before recording the full passage.

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/reservoir

Copying and downloading happen in your browser. No script upload or audio generation is needed.

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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