Many English learners are confused about how to pronounce words ending in -ed. Consider this sentence:

I passed the test!

There are three ways to say the -ed ending: /t/, /d/, and /əd/.1 Which one should you use when you say passed? Before we can answer this question, we need to know about voiced and voiceless sounds.

Voiced and Voiceless Sounds

Every sound in English can be described as either voiced or voiceless. The difference is whether you use your vocal chords when saying the sound. Many sounds come in voiced and voiceless pairs. Here are some examples:

VoicedVoiceless
/b/ as in boy/p/ as in post
/s/ as in save/z/ as in zebra
/v/ as in very/f/ as in free
/d/ as in door/t/ as in top
/ʤ/ as in joke/tʃ/ as in church
/g/ as in girl/k/ as in king
All vowelsNo vowels
/m/, /n/, /l/, /r/No voiceless equivalent

IMPORTANT: When we talk about pronunciation, we’re talking about sounds, not spelling. Spelling has nothing to do with whether a sound is voiced or voiceless. For example, the word of is pronounced with a /v/ sound at the end, even though the spelling uses an f.

Practice saying the words in the table above. Put your hand on your throat so you can feel whether you are using your voice or not. You need to know this well before you can confidently pronounce words ending in -ed.

Pronunciation Rule

There are three ways to say the -ed ending. The first two are /d/ and /t/. We won’t consider /əd/ until later. How do you know which one to use? Here’s the pronunciation rule:

Voiced goes with voiced and voiceless goes with voiceless.

This means that you consider the last sound before the ending. Don’t think about spelling here; think only about sound. Let’s look at our first example again:

I passed the test!

The last sound of pass is /s/, which is voiceless. So, because of the rule, voiceless goes with voiceless and the voiceless option is /t/. Thus passed is pronounced /pæst/.

Let’s do another example:

He listened to music.

The last sound in listen is /n/, which is voiced. Following the rule, then, gives us a /d/ sound: /ˈlɪsnd/.

So, what about the third option, /əd/? This is only for words that already end in either /t/ or /d/.2 For those words only, we add an additional syllable.3 So in this sentence:

We started class.

Start ends with /t/ so we add /əd/: /ˈstɑɚtəd/.

Warning!

Remember that this pronunciation rule is about pronunciation only. Ignore spelling. Gape ends with a voiceless /p/, even though the last letter is p.

Exercise

For each word below, choose the correct way to pronounce the -ed ending.

  1. play
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  2. walk
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  3. accept
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  4. ask
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  5. buzz
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  6. camp
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  7. dry
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  8. film
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  9. hug
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  10. mix
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  11. pray
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  12. part
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  13. question
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  14. slow
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  15. taste
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  16. visit
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  17. wave
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  18. pause
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  19. obtain
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/
  20. glow
    • /d/
    • /t/
    • /əd/

Notes

  1. When you see letters between slash (/) characters, like this /t/, this is a pronunciation symbol. Dictionaries use these to write how you should say a word. There are several different styles of pronunciation symbols. I use the style that most dictionaries aimed at English learners use. Here is an explanation of these symbols. ↩

  2. In poetry, sometimes the writer will want you to read an /əd/ where you usually wouldn’t. This is done for reasons of rhythm. In such cases, the poet will often use a grave accent (`), like this: talkèd. This accent mark tells you to pronounce that vowel as a separate syllable, even though the rule says you shouldn’t. ↩

  3. There are a few words, such as blessed, where the pronunciation changes depending on the part of speech. When blessed is a past tense verb, it follows the normal rules. But when it’s an adjective, the -ed is pronounced as an extra syllable: /ˈblɛsəd/. ↩