Phrase guide

phonetic alphabet

noun · 3 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.

No pronunciation record was provided for this word.

1

noun

Meaning 1

A writing system used to unambiguously transcribe the sounds of human speech.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Examples

  • International Phonetic Alphabet

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

2

noun

Meaning 2

A spelling alphabet: a set of code words used to substitute the names of the letters of the alphabet, usually for clarity of communication when spelling out words.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Examples

  • NATO phonetic alphabet

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: spelling alphabet, radio alphabet

Antonyms: none provided

3

noun

Meaning 3

an alphabet of characters intended to represent specific sounds of speech

Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: sound alphabet

Antonyms: none provided

Broader terms: alphabet

Narrower terms: visible speech

History

Etymology

No etymology was provided for this word.

Across languages

Translations

14 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Czech: fonetická abeceda — writing system
  • Danish: fonetisk alfabet — writing system
  • Finnish: foneettiset aakkoset — writing system
  • German: phonetisches Alphabet — writing system
  • Greek: φωνητικό αλφάβητο (fonitikó alfávito) — writing system
  • Hebrew: אָלֶפְבֵּית פוֹנֵטִי (alefbét fonéti) — writing system
  • Japanese: 発音記号 (hatsuon kigō) — writing system
  • Japanese: 音声記号 (onsei kigō) — writing system
  • Polish: alfabet fonetyczny — writing system
  • Portuguese: alfabeto fonético — writing system
  • Romanian: alfabet fonetic — writing system
  • Russian: фонети́ческий алфави́т (fonetíčeskij alfavít) — writing system
  • Swedish: fonetiskt alfabet — writing system
  • Turkish: fonetik alfabe — writing system