“Fire”: one syllable or two? | Ask the Editor | Britannica Dictionary
The word fire can be pronounced with one syllable or two.
Shelly asks if fire is one syllable or two because her students are using the word in haiku.
Our Pronunciation Editor Josh Guenter responds:
The word fire can be pronounced with either one or two syllables. Native speakers can rhyme fire with higher or not. The word higher is always two syllables. Hence, if you rhyme fire with higher, then you are pronouncing fire with two syllables, whereas if you don’t rhyme these two words, then you are pronouncing fire with just one syllable.
Native speakers can rhyme fire with higher or not
How do you rhyme ‘fire’ with ‘not’
Usually 2 syllables but that changes when I am around friends with stronger southern accents
I pronounce it with two syllables personally, but I grew up in the southern US so I’ve also heard it with one by many family members and friends. If I affect a southern drawl it becomes one syllable but that accent isn’t natural to me
Definitely 2 for me. Not sure how you would distinguish fire from other words if only 1. Fur, Fear, Fir, etc just don’t seem like the correct word to my ears. Fire rhymes with Tire in my head, and that is why the phrase tire fire has phonetic weight.
I pronounce it very distinctly as two. If I was doing an acting role and I was supposed to say it as one - I’d need to practice. My brain is wired to make it two.
