/r/ as in "rain"

/r/ is a voiced approximant of General American English, as in "rain" and "robot." To produce it, tongue curled back or bunched, no contact. Phoneme provides native-speaker audio and minimal-pair contrasts so learners can hear and practice this consonant.

How to make /r/

voiced approximant — tongue curled back or bunched, no contact.

Also written as

/ɹ/

the narrow IPA symbol for the English approximant; /r/ is the usual broad notation

Sounds that learners confuse with /r/

• /r/ vs /l/ — /l/ as in "lamp"

Minimal pairs for /r/

/r/ vs /l/

/r/	/l/
ramp	lamp
read	lead
fry	fly
right	light
rock	lock
rip	lip
grass	glass
pray	play