Rules of Stress in English

English stress is irregular. Although first-syllable stress is the most common, it can appear on any syllable of the word. Nevertheless, a few rules can be given for stress in English.

Most disyllabic nouns and adjectives are stressed on the first syllable. Examples include climate, funny, knowledge and lovely.

Many disyllabic verbs are stressed on the final syllable. Examples include decide, excuse, insist and require.

Stress the penultimate syllable of words with the suffixes -ic, -sion and -tion. The suffix occurs in words such as basic, geographic, division, extension, organization and situation.

Stress the antepenultimate syllable of words with the suffix -al. This can be seen in words such as critical and exceptional. The word circumstancial with penultimate stress is an exception to this rule.

Though English stress is variable, rules can be given regarding the stress of certain words. Words with native suffixes such as childhood, faster and kindness have first-syllable stress, but words with non-native suffixes often do not.