SAMPA chart

SAMPA charts of consonants and vowels

See a concise version of SAMPA for English sounds. Note that you will need a font that supports the Unicode to see the IPA characters.

Warning: this chart is an attempt to gather information of national SAMPA subcharts: the charts here contain conflicting characters. Most of the information here is therefore only valid for English and some other European languages. For a unified, general ASCII representation of the IPA symbols X-SAMPA should be used.

SAMPA: simplified chart of consonants (the paired signs are voiceless/voiced consonants)
	Bilabial	Labiodentals	Dentals	Alveolars	Postalveolars	Palatals	Velars	Uvulars	Pharyngeals	Glottals
Stops or affricates	p b		t d	ts dz	tS dZ	c J\	k g	q G\		?
Fricatives	p\ B	f v	T D	s z	S Z	C j\	x G	X R\	X\ ?\	h h\
Nasals	m	F		n		J	N
Laterals				l		L	5
Rhotics (flaps or trills)				4 r				R
Approximants	H	P		r\		j	w

'Note': It is (especially in Spanish and Italian) common use to represent the alveolar trill with [rr] and the alveolar flap with [r]. In Spanish, too, [jj] is used to represent the palatal fricative against the semivowel [j]. It has been proposed to use [4] for the alveolar flap, in which case [r] can be used to represent the trill (as its equivalent in the IPA system), and [j\] for the palatal fricative, keeping in this way the policy of using one letter per one IPA symbol (The backslash is used to generate alternative symbols).

Consonant modifiers:

• [ ` ] after a consonant indicates retroflex.
• [ _a ] apical (IPA subscript inverted bridge): [s_a] apical 's'
• [ _d ] dental (IPA subscript bridge)
• [ _G ] velarized diacritic (IPA superscipt gamma)
• [ _h ] aspirated diacritic (IPA superscript h)
• [ _j, ' ] palatalized. (IPA superscript j)
• [ _m ] laminal (IPA subscript box)
• [ _w ] labialized diacritic (IPA superscript w)
• [ _< ] implosive (voiced stops) (IPA hooktop)
• [ _> ] ejective (voiceless stops)
• [ _=, = ] syllabic, as in US bird [b=r\d] (also written [b3`d]), bottle ["bOt=l], button ["bVt=n]

SAMPA: simplified list of consonants
SAMPA	IPA	Description	Examples
p	p	voiceless bilabial stop	English pen
b	b	voiced bilabial stop	English but
t	t	voiceless alveolar or dental stop	English two, Spanish toma, Italian fata
d	d	voiced alveolar or dental stop	English do, Italian cade, Spanish andar
ts	ʦ	voiceless alveolar affricate	Italian calza, zoccolo, German Zeit
dz	ʣ	voiced alveolar affricate	Italian zona, manzo
tS	ʧ	voiceless postalveolar affricate	English chair, picture, Spanish mucho, Italian cena, German Deutsche
dZ	ʤ	voiced postalveolar affricate	English gin, joy, Italian giorno
c	c	voiceless palatal stop	Greek [ce] 'and', Hungarian tyúk 'hen', like British tune
J	J (overstroked j)	voiced palatal stop	Hungarian egy 'one', like British dune
k	k	voiceless velar stop	English cat, kill, queen
g	g	voiced velar stop	English go, get
q	q	voiceless uvular stop	Arabic qof
p\	φ (Greek phi)	voiceless bilabial fricative	Japanese fu
B	β (Greek beta)	voiced bilabial fricative	Some Spanish accents cabo
	ϐ (Greek beta alt)	voiced bilabial approximant	Spanish cabo, calvo
f	f	voiceless labiodental fricative	English fool, enough, Spanish and Italian falso
v	v	voiced labiodental fricative	English voice, German Welt, Italian vedere
T	θ (Greek theta)	voiceless dental fricative	English thing, Castilian Spanish caza
	ϑ (Greek theta alt)	voiceless dental approximant	Tuscan Italian sete
D	ð (Icelandic eth)	voiced dental fricative	English this
	δ (Greek delta)	voiced dental approximant	Spanish cada
s	s	voiceless alveolar fricative	English see, pass, city, Spanish sí, German Gross, Italian suono
z	z	voiced alveolar fricative	English zoo, roses, German See, Spanish riesgo, Italian rosa
S	ʃ	voiceless postalveolar fricative	English she, sure, emotion, French chemin, Italian scendo, German Sprache
Z	ʒ	voiced postalveolar fricative	French jour, English pleasure, Argentinian Spanish lluvia, Ecuadorian Spanish arriba, Tuscan Italian ragione
C	ç (cedilla)	voiceless palatal fricative	Standard German Ich, Greek [Ceri] 'hand', some English pronunciations of human
j\ (jj)	ʝ (j with crossed tail)	voiced palatal fricative	Some Spanish accents lluvia (yeísmo), some Italian dialects paglia ["paj\j\a], some German accents ja
x	x	voiceless velar fricative	Scots loch, Castilian Spanish ajo, German Buch
G	γ (Greek gamma)	voiced velar fricative	Spanish algo, agua, Arabic ghain
	ɰ	voiced velar approximant	Some Spanish accents algo, agua
X\	ħ (overstroked h)	voiceless pharyngeal fricative	Arabic h.â
?\	ʕ (Inverted ?)	voiced pharyngeal fricative	Arabic 'ayn
h	h	voiceless glottal approximant	English ham, German Hand, Colombian Spanish jamón, Tuscan Italian secondo
h\	ɦ(h with upper tail to the right)	voiced glottal approximant	Hungarian lehet, English pronunciations of behave
m	m	bilabial nasal	English man, Spanish hambre, Italian fame
F	ɱ (m with downward right tail)	labiodental nasal	Spanish infierno, enfermo, Italian trionfo, Hungarian kámfor, honvágy
n	n	alveolar nasal	English, Spanish and Italian no
J	ɲ (n with downward left tail)	palatal nasal	English canyon, Spanish año, French oignion, Italian gnocchi, Hungarian anyu
N	ŋ (n with downward right tail)	velar nasal	English singer, ring, Spanish blanco, manguera, Italian bianco, pongo, German lange, Tagalog ngayón, ngongò
l	l	alveolar lateral	English left, Spanish largo, Italian lungo
L	ʎ turned down y, alt. λ (Greek lambda)	palatal lateral	Italian aglio, famiglia, Catalan colla, Castilian Spanish cuello
5	ɫ (l with middle tilde)	velarized dental lateral	English milk (dark l), Catalan alga
4 (r)	ɾ (r without upper-left serif)	alveolar flap	Spanish pero, Italian essere
r (rr)	r	alveolar trill	Spanish perro, rey, Italian arrivare, terra
r\	ɹ (r rotate 180&deg)	retroflexed alveolar approximant	English run, very
R	ʀ (small capital R)	uvular trill	French rue, standard German Reich, Farb
P	ʋ	labiodental approximant	Dutch Waar
w	w	velo-labial approximant	English we, French oui, Spanish hueso, Italian acqua, guida
H	ɥ (turned down h)	palato-labial approximant	French huit
j	j	palatal approximant	English yes, Frech yeux, German ja, Italian ione, paio, Spanish yegua

(The sounds of the spanish b in cabo and d in cada are not represented by the symbols β, δ, despite what the creators of the SAMPA may think. Those sounds are not fricatives but approximants. Look at: - Spanish only)

SAMPA: simplified chart of vowels (the paired signs are unrounded/rounded vowels)
	Front	Central	Back
Closed or high	i I y Y	1</tt> }	M   u U
Half closed	e 2	@\ 8 @	7 o
Half open	E 9	3 3\ 6	V O
Open or low	{	a &	A Q

Vowel modifiers:

• [ ~, _~ ] after a vowel indicates that it is nasalised (e.g. French bon [bO~] ).
• [ : ] after a vowel indicates that it is lengthened (e.g. Japanese shōshō [So:So:], English see [si:] ).
• [ ` ] after a vowel indicates rhoticity (e.g. US English bird [b3`d] ).
• [ _^ ] non syllabic vowel (IPA subscript arch)

SAMPA: simplified list of vowels
SAMPA	IPA	Description	Examples
i	i	front closed unrounded vowel	English see, Spanish sí, French vite, German mieten, Italian visto
I	small capital I	front closed unrounded vowel, but somewhat more centralised and relaxed	English city, German mit
e	e	front half closed unrounded vowel	US English bear, Spanish él, French année, German mehr, Italian rete, Catalan més
E	ɛ	front half open unrounded vowel	English bed, French même,German Herr, Männer, Italian ferro, Catalan mes, Spanish perro
{	ae ligature, æ	front open unrounded vowel	English cat
y	y	front closed rounded vowel	French du, German Tür
2	slashed o, ø	front half closed rounded vowel	French deux (hence '2'), German Höhle
9	oe ligature, œ	front half open rounded vowel	French neuf (hence '9'), German Hölle
1	overstroked i, i	central closed unrounded vowel	Russian мыс [m1s] 'mouse'
@	ə (turned down e) schwa	central neutral unrounded vowel	English about, winner,German bitte
6	ɐ (turned down a) open schwa	central neutral unrounded vowel	German besser
3	ɜ (Greek epsilon mirrored to the left)	front half open unrounded vowel, but somewhat more centralised and relaxed	English bird
a	a	central open vowel	Spanish da, barra, French bateau, lac, German Haar, Italian pazzo
}	overstroked u, ʉ</strike>	central closed rounded vowel	Scottish English pool, Swedish sju
8	overstroked o, ɵ	central neutral rounded vowel	Swedish kust
&	small capital OE ligature, ɶ	front open rounded vowel	American English that
M	ɯ (upside-down m)	back closed unrounded vowel	Japanese fuji, Vietnamese ư Korean 으
7	ɤ (squeezed Greek gamma)	back half closed unrounded vowel	Vietnamese ơ Korean 어
V	ʌ (turned down v)	back half open unrounded vowel	RP and US English run, enough
A	ɑ ('d' with no upper tail)	back open unrounded vowel	English arm, US English law, standard French âme
u	u	back closed rounded vowel	English soon, Spanish tú, French goût, German Hut, Mutter, Italian azzurro, tutto
U	ʊ (turned down small capital Greek omega)	back closed rounded vowel somewhat more centralised and relaxed	English put, Buddhist
o	o	back half closed rounded vowel	US English sore, Scottish English boat, Spanish yo, French beau, German Sohle, Italian dove, Catalan ona
O	ɔ (c mirrored to the left)	back half open rounded vowel	British English law, caught, Italian cosa, Catalan dona,
Q	ɒ ('b' with no upper tail)	back open rounded vowel	British English not, cough, German Toll

Stress is indicated by ["] for primary stress, and [%] for secondary stress, placed before the stressed syllable.

SAMPA charts for specific languages

• SAMPA chart for Hungarian alphabet (in the Hungarian BambooWeb)