See your English vowels on a real formant chart

A free vowel trainer for English learners. Pick a vowel, say it into your microphone, and the tool measures its formants — the resonances that give every vowel its identity — and plots your sound against native-speaker targets on a vowel chart. You can see at a glance whether your /ɪ/ in "ship" is drifting toward the /i/ in "sheep".

How the vowel trainer works

Choose a vowel

Pick one of the 12 vowels and set the voice profile that matches you.

Record and hold

Press record and hold the vowel steadily for a second or two.

Read the chart

See your vowel plotted as a dot — close to the target means you nailed it.

Practise English vowels with live formant feedback

Voice profile

Listen voice

Target vowel

F1 — F2 —

Pick a vowel and press record to begin.

Hold the vowel like a long, steady note — don't say the consonants around it. Record somewhere quiet for the clearest reading.

Features

Live F1/F2 formant measurement Vowel chart with native-speaker targets All 12 American English vowels Voice profile for men, women and children Plain-language feedback on every attempt

What you can do

Measure the formants of any English vowel you produce, in real time
Compare your vowel to native-speaker targets on a standard vowel chart
Find out which vowel you actually said when you miss the target
Switch between male, female and child voice profiles for fair targets
Hear a reference word for each vowel before you try it

Why formants make vowels visible

Every vowel is shaped by two main resonances of the vocal tract, called the first and second formants (F1 and F2). F1 tracks how open your mouth is; F2 tracks how far forward your tongue sits. Plot those two numbers and each vowel lands in its own region of a chart — which is exactly how phoneticians map vowels. A learner can hear that their vowel is "a bit off" but not what to change; seeing the dot drift toward a neighbouring vowel turns a vague feeling into a concrete target. The tool analyses your microphone signal with linear predictive coding, the same formant-tracking method used in speech science.

Frequently asked questions

What are F1 and F2?

They are the first and second formants — the two strongest resonant frequencies of your vocal tract. Together they determine which vowel a listener hears.

Why choose a voice profile?

Formant frequencies depend on vocal-tract length, so men, women and children have different natural targets. Picking the right profile compares you against a fair reference.

Where do the target values come from?

They are the published mean formant measurements from Hillenbrand et al. (1995), a standard study of American English vowels.

My vowel was not detected — why?

Formant analysis needs a steady, voiced vowel. Hold the vowel longer, speak a little louder, and record somewhere quiet.

Does it work for British English?

The targets are American English. British vowels are close enough to be useful for most vowels, but a few will sit slightly off the target.

💡 Want us to improve this tool just for you?

We can — and it's free! Just send us a quick message with your idea. If you'd like to discuss it in detail, leave your email and we'll get back to you. You can stay anonymous.

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Who is this tool for?

🎓 Students 📚 Educators & Teachers 🗣️ Language Learners

Published 18 May 2026 Updated 21 May 2026