Phoneme /ɒ/ in Received Pronunciation

In Received Pronunciation, the IPA phonetic symbol /ɒ/ corresponds to the vowel sound in words like "lot", "stop", "cloth" and "long".

In General American "lot" and "stop" are pronounced with /ɑː/; "cloth" and "long" are pronounced with /ɔː/.

Common words
Some common words which practice the pronunciation of /ɒ/ include the following:
 * with "o": across* - along* - body - box - cost* - economic - follow - gone* - got - holiday - hot - involve - job - long* - lot - model - off* - offer* - office* - often* - policy - possible - probably - problem - product - project - shop - song* - stop - strong* - top - wrong*
 * with "a": qualify - quality - quantity - restaurant - wad - wallet - wander - want - wash - wasp - watch - what
 * with "au": Aussie* - austerity* - Australia* - Austria* - because* - cauliflower*

*: These words are pronounced with /ɔː/ in General American.

Spelling anomalies

 * cough /kɒf/*
 * knowledge /ˈnɒlɪdʒ/

Homophones

 * knot - not

/ɒr/
See Decoding exercises: "orV" and "orrV"
 * with "o": borrow - foreign - horror - orange - sorrow - sorry - tomorrow
 * with "a": warrant - warranty

Less common words

 * with "o": Congo, connoisseur /ˌkɒnəˈsɜːr/, Honduras, Morocco
 * with "e": entrepreneur /ˌɒntrəprəˈnɜːr/

Anticipated pronunciation difficulties depending on L1
Preconceived ideas and other interferences from L1 obviously interfere in many cases with how students perceive - and pronounce - sounds/words in English. The following sections aims to point out some of the most typical difficulties teachers and students may encounter regarding pronunciation.

Spanish
While /ɒ/ is very similar to the Spanish letter "o", it is actually slightly shorter, and most Spanish speakers pronounce it pretty well. However, it's useful to point out the difference between this short vowel sound and a sound which is particularly difficult for many Spanish speakers:  as in "slow". Practice may be needed to distinguish between words like "want" and "won't".