grow

/ɡroʊ/ in US English, with a hard /g/, a rounded open-mid back vowel that glides toward /oʊ/. Expect a single tight diphthong: start at /ɹ/ onset, close to /ɡroʊ/. Stress is syllable-timed but not heavy; it’s a single syllable word with primary stress, naturally connected speech when used in sentences. In UK there’s a similar pattern but often realized as /ɡrəʊ/ with less rhoticity. Source audio references: standard dictionaries and speech corpora provide /ɡroʊ/ (US) and /ɡrəʊ/ (UK). IPA guidance helps you shape the mouth: lips rounded for the offglide, tongue high-mid toward the back of the mouth.

Common mistakes: 1) De-emphasizing the initial /ɡ/ and letting airflow create a fricative instead of a clear stop. 2) Rendering the diphthong too short or ending with a flat vowel (/ɡroː/ or /ɡro/). 3) In rapid speech, you may drop the final /ʊ/ or move to an almost lax /ə/ sound. Correction: articulate a crisp /ɡ/ onset, maintain a tight, rounded /oʊ/ glide, and avoid vowel shortening by keeping the mouth rounded and allowing the back of the tongue to rise toward /oʊ/. Practice minimal pairs to lock the diphthong.

In US English, /ɡroʊ/ with a clear /oʊ/ diphthong; in many UK varieties, you’ll hear /ɡrəʊ/ with a more centralized vowel and sometimes less pronounced rhoticity in non-rhotic regions. Australian English tends to feature a broad /ɡroː/ or /ɡrəʊ/ with a slightly more open vowel and shorter duration. The main differences are vowel quality and rhoticity; rhotics are common in US but less pronounced in some UK and AU variants. Cross-dialect listening and imitation can help you pick up the subtle variations, especially in connected speech.

The difficulty lies in producing a crisp /ɡ/ onset followed by a tightly formed diphthong /roʊ/. Some speakers compress the vowel, turning /roʊ/ into a quick /ro/ or /rəʊ/, which reduces clarity. Others may misplace the tongue or over-tilt the jaw, causing a less distinct boundary between the onset and the vowel glide. Focus on a full, clean /ɡ/ release and a controlled glide toward /oʊ/. IPA guidance and slow practice help solidify the muscle memory.

Grow uniquely combines a strong initial stop /ɡ/ with a mid-to-high back vowel that requires a precise tongue position to achieve the /oʊ/ glide. It’s one of the few short, one-syllable words in everyday speech that centers on a long vowel diphthong with minimal consonantal tail. The challenge is maintaining the diphthong’s integrity in fast speech, avoiding vowel reduction, and keeping a clear, rounded lip posture through the glide.