This article used to be a joint pronunciation guide for Swedish and Norwegian. For the pronunciation guide for the latter language, see Help:IPA for Norwegian.
The chart below shows how the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) represents Swedish pronunciations in Wikipedia articles. The pronunciation is based primarily on Central Standard Swedish. See Swedish phonology for details about pronunciation.
^ abcdeIn many of the dialects that have an apicalrhotic consonant, a recursive sandhi process of retroflexion occurs, and clusters of /r/ and dental consonants /rd/, /rl/, /rn/, /rs/, /rt/ produce retroflex consonant realisations: [ɖ], [ɭ], [ɳ], [ʂ], [ʈ]. In dialects with a guttural R, such as Southern Swedish, they are [ʁd], [ʁl], [ʁn], [ʁs], [ʁt].
^Swedish /ɧ/ varies regionally and is sometimes [xʷ], [ɸˠ], or [ʂ].
^/r/ varies considerably in different dialects. It is pronounced alveolar or similarly in virtually all dialects, but in South Swedish dialects, it is uvular, similar to the Parisian French "r". At the beginning of a syllable, it can also be pronounced as a fricative [ʒ], as in English "genre" or "vision".
^ abcdeBefore /r/, the quality of non-high front vowels is changed: /ɛ/ and /ɛː/ are lowered to [æ] and [æː], and the mid /œ/ and /øː/ are lowered to open-mid [œ] and [œː]. For simplicity, no distinction is made between the mid [œ] and the open-mid [œ], with both being transcribed as ⟨œ⟩.
^ ab[ɵ] and [ʉ] are unstressed allophones of a single phoneme /ɵ/ (stressed /ɵ/ is always realized as [ɵ]):
[ɵ] is used in all closed syllables (as in kultur[kɵlˈtʉːr]) but also in some open syllables, as in musikal[mɵsɪˈkɑːl]. Some cases involve resyllabification caused by retroflexion, which makes the syllable open, as in kurtisan[kɵʈɪˈsɑːn].
[ʉ] appears only in open syllables. In some cases, [ʉ] is the only possible realization, as in känguru[ˈɕɛŋːɡʉrʉ], such as when /ɵ/ appears in hiatus, as in duell[dʉˈɛlː].
In other cases, [ɵ] is in free variation with [ʉ] so musik can be pronounced as [mɵˈsiːk] or [mʉˈsiːk] (Riad (2014:28-29)). For simplicity, only [ɵ] will be used.
^ abThe distinction between compressed [ʉ] and protruded [ʏ] is particularly difficult to hear for non-native speakers:
Swedish compressed [ʉ] sounds very close to German compressed [ʏ] (as in müssen[ˈmʏsn̩]).
Swedish protruded [ʏ] sounds more similar to English unrounded [ɪ] (as in hit) than to German compressed [ʏ], and it is very close to Norwegian protruded [ʏ] (as in nytt[nʏtː]).
^ abThe distinction between compressed [ʉː] and protruded [yː] is particularly difficult to hear for non-native speakers:
Swedish compressed [ʉː] sounds very close to German compressed [yː] (as in üben[ˈyːbn̩]).
Swedish protruded [yː] sounds more similar to English unrounded [iː] (as in leave) than to German compressed [yː], and it is very close to Norwegian protruded [yː] (as in lys[lyːs]).
^ abPlaced before the stressed syllable. For words with the second toneme, ⟨²⟩ will be used instead of the primary stress mark.
^ abUnless it is needed, the narrow phonetic transcription of Swedish tonemes is be used in articles.
^ abFinland Swedish, as well as few accents of Mainland Sweden, have a simple primary stress rather than a contrastive pitch accent. In such accents, anden (meaning 'wild duck') and anden (meaning 'spirit') are pronounced identically.
Engstrand, Olle (1999), "Swedish", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A Guide to the usage of the International Phonetic Alphabet., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 140–142, ISBN0-521-63751-1
Riad, Tomas (2014), The Phonology of Swedish, Oxford University Press, ISBN978-0-19-954357-1
[kɵlˈtʉːr]) but also in some open syllables, as in musikal 
