English Pronunciation L Sounds: Free Online Training with Videos

500 Common Words: L Sounds

Read through the information on American English L Sounds. Then test your knowledge: Take our free online test.

Introduction to the L Sound: Watch a Video.

Pronounce an American English L sound by putting your tongue in the "T" position, but press the front of your tongue against the roof of your mouth. In American English pronunciation, L is a smaller sound when it is the middle or last letter. It can even be pronounced without the tongue. You can tighten the back of your throat and pull your tongue back to create an L sound. See if you are comfortable doing that. If that is too hard, just make the sound smaller.

Do you have difficulty hearing the difference between R and L? Take the online listening test.

L: first letter

L: letter combination

L: middle

L: last

L: silent

Video

Lamp

Black

Along

Able

Could

Land

Block

Also

All

Half

Language

Blue

Always

Animal

Should

Large

Class

Build

Call

Talk

Last

Clear

Children

Circle

Walk

Late

Cold

Doll

Would

Laugh

Cloud

Color

Fall

Lay

Complete

Develop

Feel

Lead

Flame

Early

Fill

Learn

Floor

Family

Final

Leave

Fly

Field

Full

Left

Glad

Girl

Leg

Glass

Gold

Little

Less

Glow

Help

Mile

Let

Place

Hold

Numeral

Letter

Plain

Island

People

Life

Plane

Old

Possible

Light

Plant

Only

Pull

Plate

Self

Real

Line

Play

Told

Rule

List

Please

World

School

Listen

Problem

Yellow

Several

Little

Sleep

Simple

Live

Slid

Small

Long

Slide

Special

Look

Slow

Spell

Lot

Listening Test

Still

Love

Table

Low

Tell

Listening Test

Travel

Until

Usual

Vowel

Well

Wheel

While

Whole

Will

Yell

Listening Test

Read paragraphs with these words: L Sounds Extra Practice. Practice speaking with R and L speaking questions.

See also English Pronunciation News: Practice R and L Sounds .

More on the L Sound

Be careful with the second column, L: letter combination. Many people who struggle with L sounds will have difficulty when the sound is next to certain consonants--for instance, there might be difficulty next to B, but not next to C. Try to be sure you are pronouncing all combinations in about the same way.

"--le" is an old spelling. It sounds more like "ul." L is considered a semi-vowel to linguists. This means that the L sound can change. For the American L sound, there is always a slight "ul" when it is the last letter. This works even for words like "feel." This word sounds like "fee-ul" or "fee(y)ul." The small Y sound naturally comes between the long E and the short U sound (the sound in "up").

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