How to pronounce “croissant”

KWAS-on

2 syllables · stress on “KWAS”

KWASon

Britishˈkwæsɒŋ

Americankrəˈsɑːnt

In short

“croissant” is pronounced KWAS-on: 2 syllables, with the stress on “KWAS”. The French oi is a /wa/ sound, not “oy”, and the -ant ending is nasal rather than a hard /nt/. English speakers split into two camps and both are accepted. The version to avoid is kroy-SANT — reading the oi as in “boil” and the ending as a full “sant”.

Say “croissant” in 3 steps

1The oi is “wa”: the word starts “kwa”, not “kroy”.
2British model: KWAS-on, with a soft nasal ending.
3American model: kruh-SAHNT, stress on the second syllable, with the t sounded.

The version to avoid

Commonly said as: kroy-SANT — reading the oi as in “boil” and the ending as a full “sant”

The French oi is a /wa/ sound, not “oy”, and the -ant ending is nasal rather than a hard /nt/. English speakers split into two camps and both are accepted.

Hear real people say it

Model audio is consistent; real speech is not. Hearing several actual speakers is what makes a word recognisable when someone says it at full speed.

Real speakers

3 human recordings

Actual people saying “croissant”, not a synthetic voice. Real speech varies — that variation is what you need to recognise, and what a single model voice cannot show you.

Recordings from Wikimedia Commons by Dvortygirl, No machine-readable author provided. Denelson83 assumed (based on copyright claims). and Wikimedia Commons contributor, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Full credits.

Practise it out loud

Reading about a sound does not change your mouth. Say it, hear it back, and fix one thing at a time.

Say it yourself

0/6 practised

Listen first, then record. You get feedback on the individual sounds, the stress and the rhythm — no account needed, and nothing is stored.

Three speakers per accent

Recordings are used only to generate this feedback and are not stored. Your accent is never penalised: IELTS scores intelligibility, and so do we.

British vs American

British English keeps a French-influenced KWAS-on; American English uses an anglicised kruh-SAHNT. Both are standard.

The sounds inside this word

Each links to a full guide with mouth position, audio and drills. If a word keeps failing, the problem is usually one of these.

kk as in key ww as in we æa as in cat ss as in see ɒo as in hot ŋng as in sing

More food and drink words

Same pattern, same fix. Learning them as a group is far faster than one at a time.

quinoaKEEN-wah gnocchiNYOK-ee bruschettabroo-SKET-uh espressoe-SPRES-oh jalapeñohal-uh-PAY-nyoh phoFUH

Frequently asked questions

How do you pronounce croissant?

croissant is pronounced KWAS-on, written /ˈkwæsɒŋ/ in IPA. The oi is “wa”: the word starts “kwa”, not “kroy”.

How many syllables are in croissant?

two: KWAS-on. The stress falls on “KWAS”.

What is the most common mistake with croissant?

kroy-SANT — reading the oi as in “boil” and the ending as a full “sant”. The French oi is a /wa/ sound, not “oy”, and the -ant ending is nasal rather than a hard /nt/. English speakers split into two camps and both are accepted.

Is croissant pronounced differently in British and American English?

British English keeps a French-influenced KWAS-on; American English uses an anglicised kruh-SAHNT. Both are standard. IELTS accepts either accent, so choose one model and stay consistent.

The full sound library

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