A near-close vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close vowel is that the tongue is positioned similarly to a close vowel, but slightly less constricted. Near-close vowels sometimes described as lax variants of the fully-close vowels. The near-close vowels identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:

• near-close near-front unrounded vowel ^*
• near-close near-front rounded vowel ^*
• near-close near-back rounded vowel ^*

Vowels

Voyelle haute inférieure