Phrase guide

phonetic symbol

noun · 2 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 written symbol used systematically for denoting a phoneme or any other phonetic quality in utterance.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Topics: human-sciences, linguistics, phonetics, phonology, sciences

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

2

noun

Meaning 2

a written character used in phonetic transcription of represent a particular speech sound

Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

Broader terms: character, grapheme, graphic symbol

History

Etymology

No etymology was provided for this word.

Across languages

Translations

3 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Chinese Mandarin: 音標 /音标 (yīnbiāo) — written symbol denoting a phoneme
  • Japanese: 発音記号 (hatsuon kigō) — written symbol denoting a phoneme
  • Japanese: 音声記号 (onsei kigō) — written symbol denoting a phoneme