Pronunciation exercises: /əʊ/ vs /ɔː/

Together with the page possible pronunciation difficulties, this page sets out some common words teachers can use to help their students become more aware of how they can improve their pronunciation of the vowel sounds /əʊ/ and /ɔː/.

/ɔː/ is a monophthong and /əʊ/ is a diphthong. Both sounds are not very similar, but /əʊ/ in American English sounds [oʊ] and [o] is similar to [ɔː].

/əʊ/

 * with "oa": boat - coast - coat - foam - goal - toast
 * with "ow": blow - bowl - flow - know - low - own - show - snow - throw
 * with "o" and magic e: bone - choke - close - cone - gnome - hole - home - hope - phone - Rome - stone - tone - vote
 * with "o": both - go - mobile - notable - only - open - over - program
 * with "ol": cold - control - fold - gold - hold - old - poll - roll - sold - told
 * with "os": ghost - host - most
 * with "ou": although - shoulder - soul - though

homophones: hole - whole; loan - lone; poll - pole; roll - role; soul - sole;

/ɔː/
Some common words containing /ɔː/ include the following:
 * with "oa": abroad - broad
 * with "ough": ought - thought
 * past tense and past participle: bought - brought - fought - sought - thought


 * with "a": water;
 * with "al": almost - already - alter - always - chalk - false - salt (also /sɒlt/) - talk - walk
 * with "all": ball - call - fall - hall - mall - small - walk - wall
 * with "aw": dawn - flaw - hawk - jaw - law - lawn - raw - saw - shawl - thaw - yawn
 * with "au": auction - August - author - autumn - cause - clause - daughter - fault - launch
 * past tense and past participle: caught - taught

/əʊ/ vs /ɔː/

 * Minimal pairs: boat - bought; bold - bald; bowl - ball; coal - call; coat - caught; choke - chalk; close (v.) - clause; cold - called; flow - flaw; hole - hall; Joe - jaw; low - law; poll - Paul; row - raw; sew - saw; woke - walk;


 * These words don't rhyme: road - broad

Received Pronunciation
Since /r/ before a consonant is silent in Received Pronunciation, the following minimal pairs exist:
 * bone - born; poke - pork;

General American
In some cases /ɒ/ is /ɔː/.
 * coast - cost; own - on; won't - want;

Spanish L1
See Pronunciation exercises: /əʊ/ vs /ɒ/ § Spanish L1.