Spanish runs beautifully on five vowels. English, less economically, uses about twelve — so several English vowels sit on distinctions Spanish never needed to make. Most of what follows is vowel work, plus a few consonants where the two languages draw the map differently.
There is good news too: Spanish already owns the soft th inside words like nada — a sound plenty of other languages have to learn from zero.
Spanish has one i. English splits it in two, and ship vs sheep hangs entirely on the short, relaxed half Spanish never needed.
Hear the pair side by side →In Spanish, b and v are two spellings of one sound. English keeps two sounds: for v the top teeth touch the lip; for b they never do.
Hear the pair side by side →If your Spanish has no θ — most of Latin America — English think will lean toward sink. The tongue tip goes between the teeth, and the air stays soft.
Hear the pair side by side →You already make this sound in the middle of nada. English also wants it at the start of words, where d loves to stand in.
Hear the pair side by side →Spanish has no sh, so she drifts toward see. Pull the tongue slightly back from the s position and round the lips a touch.
Hear the pair side by side →In some Spanish accents y hardens into a j-like sound. English yes wants the soft glide — no contact, just a fast ee.
Hear the pair side by side →The a of apple sits between Spanish a and e — a vowel with its own address, wider and lower than either.
Hear the pair side by side →Book and moon use two different u-sounds in English; Spanish u covers only the long one.
Hear the pair side by side →English day is a journey — it starts at e and glides toward ee. Spanish e stays put, which is exactly the difference between late and let.
Hear the pair side by side →Which of these are actually yours? That is the part no list can know.
Nunzio records you reading a sentence and scores every sound in it on your phone — nothing is uploaded — then names the one worth your next ten minutes. No list, no guessing: your recording. Nunzio — Accent Coach is coming to the App Store and Google Play.