English approximations are in some cases very loose, and only intended to give a general idea of the pronunciation. See Slovak phonology for a more thorough look at the sounds.
Primary stress always falls on the first syllable of a word.
Notes
^ abcdefghiApart from being the main realization of the phonemes /b, d, dz, dʒ, ɡ, ɟ, z, ʒ/, [b, d, dz, dʒ, ɡ, ɟ, z, ʒ] also occur as allophones of /p, t, ts, tʃ, k, c, s, ʃ/ before the voiced obstruents /b, d, ɟ, ɡ, dʒ, z, ʒ, ɦ/. [v] also occurs as an allophone of /f/ in the same environment.
^ abcdefghApart from being the main realization of the phonemes /c, k, p, s, ʃ, t, ts, tʃ/, [c, k, p, s, ʃ, t, ts, tʃ] also occur as word-final allophones of /ɟ, ɡ, b, z, ʒ, d, dz, dʒ/, unless the following word beings with any of the voiced obstruents /b, d, ɟ, ɡ, dʒ, z, ʒ, ɦ/ and is pronounced without a pause, in which case they are realized as voiced [ɟ, ɡ, b, z, ʒ, d, dz, dʒ].
^ abcdThe phones transcribed [f, v, ʋ, w] are allophones of a single /v/ phoneme (but note that [f, v] are also allophones of the /f/ phoneme):
• [f] occurs word-initially before the voiceless obstruents /p, t, c, k, tʃ, f, s, ʃ, x/;
• [v] occurs word-initially before the voiced obstruents /b, d, ɟ, ɡ, dʒ, z, ʒ, ɦ/;
• [w] or [ʋ] (in our transcriptions always represented as [w]) occur in the syllable coda;
• [ʋ] occurs in all other cases (Hanulíková & Hamann (2010:374)).
^The vowel spelled ⟨ä⟩ used to be pronounced with the /æ/ phoneme, the usage of which has become rare and/or dialectal.
References
Hanulíková, Adriana; Hamann, Silke (2010), "Slovak"(PDF), Journal of the International Phonetic Association40 (3): 373–378, doi:10.1017/S0025100310000162
Kráľ, Ábel (1988), Pravidlá slovenskej výslovnosti, Bratislava: Slovenské pedagogické nakladateľstvo
Short, David (2002), "Slovak", in Comrie, Bernard; Corbett, Greville G., The Slavonic Languages, London and New York: Routledge, pp. 533–592, ISBN 9780415280785