Speak English more clearly

You do not need a "perfect" accent to be understood the first time. What listeners need is clear delivery: a steady pace, pauses in the right places, and sentence endings that don't fade. That comes from speaking out loud often, hearing clear English back, and copying its rhythm.

Airi is a voice partner for exactly that. She answers out loud in a natural voice you can model yourself on, so you can echo how she stresses words and where she pauses, and ask her to have you repeat a tricky sentence. The tables below cover the moments when people say "Sorry?" and what to change in each one.

A quick example with Airi

Let's warm up. Tell me about your morning.

I wake up early and I take the bus to office.

"To the office." Nice — say that whole sentence again, slow and clear for me.

I wake up early and I take the bus to the office.

Much clearer! Hear how you paused? That's exactly it.

Try a conversation like this, free600 free credits, about 8 minutes of speaking. No card.

Five reasons people ask you to repeat yourself in English

When people keep saying "Sorry?", notice when they say it. The moment usually points to the part of your delivery to fix.

What the listener does	The likely cause	What to change
Says "Sorry?" to your very first words	They have not had time to tune in to your voice	Greet first, then give the detail: "Good morning. I have a reservation under Tanaka."
Catches the start of a sentence but not the end	Your voice dropped and sped up on the last words	Keep the last word strong: "The meeting is on Thursday."
Writes down the wrong time or number	It went past once, inside a fast sentence	Pause, then say it a second way: "At seven fifteen. Quarter past seven."
Looks lost halfway through a long answer	No pauses, so your ideas ran together	Pause at each slash: "My flight was canceled, / so I need a room / for one more night."
Misses the same word twice	Something in that word, such as one sound or the stressed syllable, is not what they expect	Stop repeating it and describe it: "I need a charger. The cable for my phone."

The first row rests on a known effect. Clarke and Garrett (Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 2004) found that native English listeners were slower at first to process English spoken with a foreign accent, and that the gap shrank within about a minute of listening. A greeting or a few easy words gives your listener some of that time before the detail that matters.

The pace of clear English: where to pause and which word to stress

"Slow down" is only half the advice. Murray Munro and Tracey Derwing had listeners rate sentences spoken by learners of English for how accented and how easy to understand they were (Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 2001). Very slow speech tended to get lower ratings, just as very fast speech did, and the best-rated speech was somewhat faster than the learners' usual pace. So if you do slow down, where should the extra time go? Picheny, Durlach and Braida (Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 1986), in research on speaking to people with hearing loss, compared conversational speech with speech produced with an effort to be clear. In the clear version, the speakers slowed down by adding pauses between words and holding individual sounds longer, and they released the final consonants that conversational speech often leaves unfinished.

You do not need a pause after every word. Put your pauses between groups of words that belong together, shown by the slashes below. In each group one word, usually the last word that carries meaning, takes the main stress (bold below). Say it a little longer and louder than the words around it, and finish its last consonant.

I'd like to book a table / for four / at seven thirty / on Friday.
Could you tell me / where the nearest bank is?
I'm calling about my order. / It hasn't arrived yet.

What to say when someone doesn't understand your English

Repeat the key part once, more slowly. If that fails, do not say it a third time the same way: change the words, spell it, or show it.

The moment	Say
The first "Sorry?"	Sure. A table for four, please.
The second "Sorry?"	Let me put that another way.
One word is the problem	It's the thing you use to dry your hair.
It is a name	I'll spell it for you: T, A, N, A, K, A.
You went too fast	Sorry, I'm going too fast. Let me slow down.
Your sentence fell apart	Sorry, let me start over.
Nothing is working	Can I show you on my phone?

Five habits that make your English harder to understand

Instead of	Say	Why
Pharmacy. Pharmacy! PHARMACY!	I'm looking for a pharmacy. A place to buy medicine.	Louder does not help a listener who cannot place the word. A description gives them another way in.
Sorry, my English is very bad.	Let me say that again.	An apology gives the listener nothing to work with. A second try does.
I wanted to ask if maybe it is possible to change my appointment on Monday to another day because I have to work.	I have an appointment on Monday. Could I move it to another day?	Short sentences are easier to say cleanly, and each one ends in a pause.
Gate B12?	Excuse me, I'm looking for gate B12.	A full sentence shows what you need and lets the listener tune in before the detail.
Yes, yes. (when you doubt they understood)	Just to check: two tickets for tomorrow, right?	Repeating the key facts catches a mistake while it is still easy to fix.

An eight-minute rehearsal with Airi for speaking English clearly

Airi does not score pronunciation or analyze sounds. What she can do is repeat back what she heard, which gives you a rough check on whether a name, a time or an order arrived the way you said it. Treat it as a hint and no more: a voice AI can catch a word that a person would miss, and miss one that a person would catch. Your free credits cover about eight minutes of speaking, roughly enough for one run.

Set the scene: "Be a hotel receptionist taking my reservation. Ask for my name, my arrival date and my arrival time, one at a time, and repeat each one back to me."
Give each answer in short groups of words with a pause between them. If she repeats something back wrong, do not say it louder: pause more, or say it a second way.
Practice the repair: "Now pretend you didn't catch my last sentence. Say 'Sorry?' and I'll try it another way."
Describe your day in three short sentences, with a pause after each idea and the last word of each sentence strong.
When she shows a small fix, say the corrected sentence once, slowly. Then run the reservation again and see whether more of it arrives the first time.

How to get the most from it

Copy the rhythm

English has stress and pauses. Echo Airi's pattern, not just the words.

Slow down

Clear beats fast. Practice saying sentences a touch slower until they land.

Repeat the hard ones

Ask Airi to drill a tricky sentence until it feels smooth.

Start speaking today

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Frequently asked questions

Do I have to lose my accent?

No. Clear and accent-free are different things. In research by Munro and Derwing (Language Learning, 1995), a strong foreign accent did not necessarily make speech harder to understand. Work on your pauses, a strong key word and sentence endings that do not fade. Your accent can stay.

Does Airi analyze my pronunciation?

No. Airi does not score pronunciation or analyze individual sounds. She gives you a clear voice to copy, replies to what she heard, and shows one small fix at a time. If you ask her to repeat a name or a number back to you, you get a rough check on whether it arrived.

How often should I practice?

A few minutes on most days. Pausing between ideas and finishing your sentences have to become automatic, and short, regular practice out loud is easier to keep up than one long session a week. Give each session one target, such as strong sentence endings.

Should I speak slowly to be understood in English?

Slower than a rush, but not word by word. In a study by Munro and Derwing (Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 2001), listeners tended to give lower ratings to very slow speech as well as very fast speech, and their highest ratings went to speech somewhat faster than the learners' usual pace. Keep a steady pace and pause briefly between ideas.

How do I stop mumbling when I speak English?

Check three habits: rushing, barely opening your mouth, and letting the ends of sentences fade. Pause between ideas, open your mouth more on the important words, and say the last word of each sentence at full volume.

Is it free to try?

Yes. You get 600 free credits when you sign up with Google, about eight minutes of speaking, with no credit card. That is roughly enough for one run of the rehearsal above. After that there are one-off packs of USD 5, 10 or 20, with no subscription.

Last updated: 2026-10-03