Three sounds made at almost the same spot in the mouth: /ʃ/ as in ship, /tʃ/ as in chip and /dʒ/ as in jeep. Many Spanish speakers say chip for ship. French and European Portuguese speakers tend to do the opposite and say sheep for cheap. Speakers of several Spanish varieties also swap /dʒ/ and /j/, so job and yob, or jet and yet, become confused.
Which mistake you make depends on your first language, but the fix for all of them begins with the same physical test, described in the first section below. These are the key pairs to keep in mind as you read:
- /ʃ/ and /tʃ/: ship, chip · share, chair · sheep, cheap · wash, watch · cash, catch · shoes, choose
- /tʃ/ and /dʒ/: cheap, jeep · chin, gin · choke, joke · rich, ridge · batch, badge · etch, edge
- /ʃ/ and /dʒ/: shin, gin · shock, jock · shade, jade
One test separates all three sounds
/ʃ/ is a fricative: continuous friction that you can sustain indefinitely. /tʃ/ and /dʒ/ are affricates: a complete closure followed by a fricative release. That structural difference gives you a test that needs no phonetic training at all.
The five-second test. Try to hold each sound for five seconds. Shhhhhhh works — it is the sound you make to ask for quiet. Ch and j cannot be held, because they begin with the tongue sealed against the roof of the mouth. If you can sustain the first sound of chair, you are actually saying share.
The only difference between /tʃ/ and /dʒ/ is voicing, and here the usual caveat applies: in final position the more reliable cue for an English listener is the length of the preceding vowel. The vowel in ridge is clearly longer than the vowel in rich, and that duration difference does more work than the buzz on the consonant.
Which substitution you make depends on your first language
| First language | Typical error | Example |
|---|---|---|
| French | No affricates; /tʃ/ → /ʃ/ and /dʒ/ → /ʒ/ | chair → share; job → zhob |
| Portuguese (Brazilian) | [tʃ] and [dʒ] exist but only before /i/; inserted where English has plain /t d/ | ten stays fine, but teen → cheen |
| Spanish | Has /tʃ/ but no /ʃ/ or /dʒ/ in most dialects | she → chee; jet → yet |
| German | Has /ʃ/, lacks /dʒ/ and /ʒ/ | jam → tscham or yam |
| Japanese | /ʃ/ and /tʃ/ occur, but only before certain vowels | she is fine; shame and shore are unstable |
| Mandarin | Confusion with the retroflex and alveolo-palatal series x, sh, q, ch, j, zh | Tongue position too far back or too palatal |
/ʒ/: the sound that hides in ordinary words
English has a fourth sound in this family, /ʒ/, the voiced counterpart of /ʃ/. It is rare, it almost never starts a word, and learners usually replace it with /dʒ/ without noticing. Yet it appears in words used every day: measure /ˈmeʒər/, decision /dɪˈsɪʒən/, usually /ˈjuːʒuəli/, television, pleasure, casual, garage, vision, Asia.
The fix is exactly the five-second test applied again: /ʒ/ can be held, /dʒ/ cannot. Compare vision with pigeon, or lesion with legion, and you should be able to sustain the middle consonant in the first word of each pair but not the second.
Spelling will not tell you which sound to use
The letters give almost no reliable guidance, which is why memorising by sound rather than by spelling matters here.
- ch is
/tʃ/in church,/k/in chemistry, character, ache, school, and/ʃ/in machine, chef, Chicago, brochure. - ti, ci, si before a vowel usually give
/ʃ/: nation, special, pension, ancient, delicious. - su and si after a vowel often give
/ʒ/: measure, usual, vision, occasion. - g before e, i, y is often
/dʒ/: gem, giant, gym, energy — but not in get, give, girl, gift. - t plus u frequently becomes
/tʃ/in natural speech: nature, picture, future, actually, situation.
Pairs and sentences to practise
/ʃ/ against /tʃ/: ship / chip, share / chair, sheep / cheap, wash / watch, cash / catch, mush / much, dish / ditch, wish / witch, shoes / choose, marsh / march.
/tʃ/ against /dʒ/: cheap / jeep, chin / gin, choke / joke, chest / jest, rich / ridge, batch / badge, search / surge, lunch / lunge, etch / edge, cheer / jeer.
/ʒ/ against /dʒ/: vision / pigeon, lesion / legion, pleasure / pledger, version / virgin.
Then move to sentences, where the contrast has to survive alongside everything else: Watch me wash the car. She chose those shoes. The cheap jeep is in the garage. I usually measure it with much more care. Which witch watched the match?
Frequently asked questions
How do I tell SH and CH apart when I practise alone?
Use duration. SH is a fricative and can be held for as long as your breath lasts, which is why it is the sound used to ask for silence. CH is an affricate: it starts with the tongue sealed against the roof of the mouth, so it cannot be sustained. If you can stretch the first sound of chair, you are producing share instead.
What is the difference between the sound in vision and the sound in pigeon?
Vision has /ʒ/, a voiced fricative that can be held. Pigeon has /dʒ/, a voiced affricate that begins with a complete closure and therefore cannot be held. Learners commonly replace /ʒ/ with /dʒ/ without noticing, which affects everyday words such as measure, usually, decision, television and garage.
Why does ch sound different in church, chemistry and machine?
English spelling records word origin more than pronunciation. The ch of church is native Germanic vocabulary and gives /tʃ/. The ch of chemistry and character comes through Greek and gives /k/. The ch of machine, chef and brochure comes from French and gives /ʃ/. There is no rule that predicts this reliably, so these words are best learned individually with their transcription.
Which of these sounds should Spanish speakers work on first?
SH, written /ʃ/, because most Spanish dialects do not have it and substitute CH, so she becomes chee. The five-second holding test usually produces a correct /ʃ/ immediately. After that, work on /dʒ/ in jet and job, which Spanish speakers often replace with a /j/ sound.
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