Hundred

#pronunciation Published: 2021-11-10

Can you pronounce the English word “hundred”? In most dictionaries, it is defined as /ˈhəndrəd/ or /ˈhʌndrəd/, or maybe sometimes /ˈhʌndərd/.

Generally speaking, basic but slightly long words such as “hundred” or “something” often sound different in fast speech or in certain dialects. Some of these pronunciation changes may not be apparent from the original IPA.

DARE¹ sometimes provides a detailed IPA description of how exactly a word might be pronounced. In this post, we’ll look at the possible pronunciations of hundred².

1. /ˈhʌndərd/
2. /ˈhʌndərt/
3. /ˈhʌndər/
4. /ˈhʌnərd/
5. /ˈhʌnərt/
6. /ˈhʌnəd/
7. /ˈhʌnət/

The last /d/ sound can change to /t/, which is understandable without explanation. On the other hand, the middle /d/ sound can be completely omitted, which can be understood by analogy with the case where the sound of “in there” can be like /in.nɛr/.

Well, I realized that “one hundred /ˈhʌnəd/ years” sounds pretty natural to me and is very easy to pronounce.

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