The history of Hungarian experimental phonetics shows that our predecessors followed contemporary trends in the field, and quickly adopted the idea of using various devices in studying speech. Their results contributed to laying the foundations of modern phonetics. The first fifty years of the last century saw important advances in speech research both in respect of the study of articulation (e.g., palatography, X-ray studies, kymography, measurements of air flow and lip movements) and speech acoustics (using oscillograms and spectrography). Progress was also made in applied speech research and speech technology. The paper summarizes the most important achievements of Hungarian experimental phonetics in that era showing the wide range of interest of scholars in the field who worked both abroad and in Hungary.