Your accent is not what lowers the score
Speaking tests measure how easily a listener understands you, not how native you sound. A clear Thai accent is compatible with the top bands. Missing word endings are not.
Word endings: where most of the marks go
A Thai syllable can only end in a small set of sounds — p, t, k, m, n, ng — and even those are not released: the mouth closes on them. Thai has no consonant clusters at the end of a syllable at all.
English ends words on almost any consonant, often two or three together, and releases them audibly. So English endings tend to be simplified or lost:
- rice → rye, bus → but
- milk → mil
- asked → ask or at
- friends → fren
This matters more in English than in Thai, because English keeps grammar at the ends of words. Lose the ending and the grammar goes with it:
| What you meant | What it becomes | What was lost |
|---|---|---|
| She works here | She work here | third-person -s |
| I walked home | I walk home | past tense -ed |
| Two books | Two book | plural -s |
Final l and r
At the end of a Thai syllable, r and l both surface as an n-like sound. Carried into English, word endings change:
- ball → ban, hotel → hoten
- car → ca, four → fo
Practise holding the tongue up for a final l (ball, call, feel) and letting the tongue curl for a final r (car, four, more).
The sound contrasts worth fixing
| Sound | Why it's hard | What a listener may hear |
|---|---|---|
| /v/ | Not in Thai; becomes /w/ or /f/. | very → wery |
| /θ/ and /ð/ (th) | Not in Thai; become /t/ or /d/. | think → tink, they → day |
| /z/ | Not in Thai; becomes /s/. | zoo → soo, is → iss |
| /ʃ/ and /dʒ/ | Approximated with /tɕ/ or /s/. | she → see, job → chob |
| /g/ | Restricted in Thai; becomes /k/. | go → ko, big → bik |
| /ɪ/ vs /i:/ | The contrast is unfamiliar. | ship / sheep |
Stress, not tone
Thai carries meaning in tone on each syllable. English does not use tone that way. It leans on one syllable per word, squashes the others, and uses pitch across a whole sentence rather than on single syllables.
- RE-cord (noun) · re-CORD (verb) — same spelling, different word.
- Content words are stressed; a, the, of, to, is are said quickly and quietly.
Because each Thai syllable carries its own tone, English can come out evenly weighted. Leaning harder on the stressed syllable makes you noticeably easier to follow.
How to practise
- Record yourself. As you speak you hear what you intended, not what came out.
- Spend the first weeks on word endings. Read aloud and finish every final consonant, especially -s and -ed. This one habit moves two scores.
- Then final /l/ and /r/, then one contrast from the table, in full sentences.
- Check, do not guess. Get an external read on which sounds a listener actually missed.
Aflo scores your speech sound by sound and shows you which sounds were hardest to catch.
For the test, and for real life
For the exam: finish your words. Everything else here is secondary to that.
Outside the exam you may want to sound more American or more British, for work or for yourself. That is a reasonable goal and a separate one from scoring well. Clarity is what the test pays for; the accent can stay.
Frequently asked questions
Will my Thai accent lower my speaking score?
No. These tests score intelligibility rather than native-likeness, and Aflo's pronunciation scoring has a floor so that differences which are only accent stop affecting the score. What lowers a score is missing word endings.
What should I fix first?
Word endings. A Thai syllable can only end in a small set of unreleased sounds and has no final clusters, so English endings get simplified or lost. Because English keeps grammar at the ends of words, that habit is heard as a grammar mistake as well, so it lowers two scores at once.
Do my tones affect my English?
Not directly — English does not use tone to distinguish words. What transfers is even weighting: each Thai syllable carries its own tone, so English can come out with every syllable given equal weight. English leans hard on one syllable per word, so word stress is worth learning.
How do I know which sounds to work on?
Record yourself and get an external check; you cannot judge your own pronunciation while producing it. Aflo compares your speech with the expected pronunciation one sound at a time and reports the sounds a listener was most likely to miss.