Shakhmatov is an author of several works in phonetics, dialectology, lexicography, syntax, history of East Slavic languages, modern Russian literary language, history of East Slavic people, history of Old Russian literature, Slavic accentology. In his monographies "Research in a field of the Russian phonetics" (Исследования в области русской фонетики, 1894), "To the history of sounds in the Russian language" (К истории звуков русского языка, 1903), and others, Shakhmatov set a goal to restore the All-Russian pronunciation in all of its phonetical details by way of juxtaposition of old and modern eastern Slavic dialects with involving of data from other Slavic languages.