A syllabic consonant is a consonant that forms a syllable on its own, like the m, n, and l in some pronunciations of the English words rhythm, button, and bottle. It is a consonant that replaces the vowel . Syllabic consonants in most languages are sonorants, such as nasals and liquids. Very few have syllabic obstruents, such as stops and fricatives in normal words, but English has syllabic fricatives in paralinguistic words like shh! and zzz.

There are four consonants in American English that can replace the vowel . In addition, syllabic consonants can sometimes serve as the nucleus of a syllable in their own right, typically only nasals and liquids occur as syllabic consonants. For example, in the word rhythm, the second syllable is unstressed, and it’s pretty short. Most of the time, in ordinary rapid speech, that second syllable doesn’t have a vowel in it at all. The .