German Alphabet: Letters, Sounds, Umlauts, and ß

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The German alphabet uses the same 26 basic letters as English. It also uses the umlauted vowels ä, ö, and ü, plus ß and its capital form ẞ. In this guide, I’ll show you the letter names, the main sound patterns, and the spelling details that are most useful when you start reading German.

German spelling is more regular than English spelling, but it is not perfectly phonetic. Vowel length, loanwords, regional pronunciation, and a few letter combinations still need attention. The patterns below will give you a dependable starting point.

First, let’s look at the 26 “normal” German letters. Just like in English, each letter has a name. The name doesn’t always hint at how the letter is pronounced, in the same way that the English “w” sound doesn’t appear in that letter’s name (“double-u”).

This table gives the name of each letter, and the international phonetic alphabet (IPA) pronunciation of each name:

If you don’t know how to read IPA, check out the Fluent in 3 Months guide to reading IPA.

Just as English speakers use both “zee” and “zed,” German letter names have regional variants. The chart gives common names used in Germany. In Austria, for example, you may hear je (/jeː/) for J and que (/kveː/) for Q, and the stress in Ypsilon may differ.

Below we’ll also cover four “special” letters of German (“ß” and the umlauted vowels), but first, let’s look at how the above 26 letters are pronounced.

Before we start, a quick reminder: standard German writes nouns and words used as nouns with an initial capital.

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How to Pronounce the German Alphabet

As I said earlier, German pronunciation is generally consistent. It’s usually clear how a word should be pronounced from its spelling. The catch is that some letters have more than one pronunciation depending on their position in the word. There are also a lot of special letter combinations you need to remember, much like how the “sh” in English sounds different to an “s” followed by an “h”.

German pronunciation varies across Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and other German-speaking communities. The descriptions below use broadly taught standard pronunciations and flag several common regional alternatives.

How to Pronounce German Consonants

Several consonants have close English equivalents. The letters f, h, k, m, n, and p will feel familiar to many English speakers, though the exact sound still depends on accent and position. German l and t are also familiar, but the tongue is often a little farther forward than in many varieties of English.

The following consonants are easy, too:

• c is uncommon in native German words outside combinations such as sch. Before e, i, ä, ö, or y it is often /ts/, while other positions often use /k/. Loanwords and names can follow other patterns, so check unfamiliar words.
• j is usually /j/, like the English “y” in “yes”: ja begins with that sound.
• qu is usually /kv/, as in Quelle. Q normally appears with u, although recent loanwords and names can be exceptions.
• v is /f/ in many native words, including Vater, but /v/ occurs in loanwords such as Vase.
• w is usually /v/, as at the beginning of Wasser.
• x is usually /ks/, including at the beginning of Xylophon.
• z is /ts/, as at the beginning of Zeit.

If your first language is English, practise German v and w with whole words rather than swapping one letter mechanically for another. Compare Vater /ˈfaːtɐ/, Vase /ˈvaːzə/, and Wasser /ˈvasɐ/: the spelling pattern depends on the word’s history.

Some consonants change their pronunciation depending on their position in the word:

• b, d, and g are devoiced at the end of a syllable in much of the German-speaking area, so Lob, Rad, and Tag end with sounds close to /p/, /t/, and /k/. The spelling does not change, and regional realization varies.
• s is often /z/ at the beginning of a word before a vowel in the standard pronunciation taught in Germany, as in Sonne. It is /s/ in positions such as the end of Haus. Austrian and Swiss standard pronunciations often use /s/ where speakers in Germany use /z/.

German r has several standard and regional realizations. At the beginning of a syllable you may hear a uvular trill, fricative, or approximant from the back of the mouth, and you may also hear an alveolar trill made at the front. After a vowel, especially in unstressed -er, r is often vocalized to a vowel-like sound.

An alveolar trill is common in parts of Switzerland, Austria, Bavaria, and elsewhere. It is a valid German r, not a mistake to eliminate. If you want to practise that version, use the Fi3M guide to pronouncing the rolled R.

How to Pronounce German Consonant Combinations

In English, certain letter combinations like “ch”, “th” and “sh” have special pronunciations that must be learned separately. German has its own set of combinations, but they aren’t really harder than the English ones.

One important combination is ch. After front vowels and diphthongs such as i, e, ä, ö, ü, ei, eu, and äu, and after many consonants, standard pronunciation uses the voiceless palatal fricative /ç/, the ich-Laut. Keep the middle of your tongue close to the hard palate and let air pass through the narrow gap. You will hear it in ich, mich, nicht, and Milch.

(In some German dialects this sound is pronounced like an English “sh”, which is how JFK pronounced it in his famous line “ich bin ein Berliner”.)

After the back vowels a, o, and u, and after au, ch is normally /x/, the ach-Laut. Make it farther back in the mouth, with air passing between the back of the tongue and the soft palate. You will hear it in auch, Buch, and machen.

This front-versus-back tongue pattern explains many native German words, but loanwords and names can use /k/, /ʃ/, or another pronunciation. Treat the two ch sounds as your starting model, then check exceptions in a dictionary with audio.

Here are the other consonant clusters:

• tsch is /tʃ/, like the English “ch” in “church,” as in Deutsch.
• sch is /ʃ/, like the English “sh” in “ship.”
• sp and st normally begin with /ʃ/ at the start of a word or stressed stem: Spiel begins /ʃp/ and Stadt begins /ʃt/. In other positions and in loanwords, the pronunciation can differ.
• ng is usually /ŋ/, as in singen, without a separate audible g in standard pronunciation.
• Word-final -ig is often /ɪç/ in the standard pronunciation taught in Germany, but /ɪk/ is common in southern Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
• pf is the affricate /pf/: release a p directly into an f, as at the beginning of Pferd.

How to Pronounce German Vowels

German distinguishes short and long vowel sounds, and the quality often changes with the length. English comparisons are only approximations because English accents vary. Use the IPA and native audio together when you practise the examples below.

If you really want to master the pronunciation of vowels, I strongly recommend studying the International Phonetic Alphabet and learning the basics of vowel phonetics so you know what terms like “vowel height” and “vowel roundness” mean. You don’t need a degree in linguistics, but understanding these concepts makes it much easier to know where to put your tongue to pronounce a difficult vowel.

I’ll avoid technical phonetic stuff as much as possible in my descriptions, but I’ll include the IPA symbol for each vowel sound, written in square brackets, e.g. [a].

• a is short /a/ in Mann and long /aː/ in Zahl and Staat. It is more open than the vowel many English speakers use in “hat.”
• e is short /ɛ/ in Bett and long /eː/ in Weg. For /eː/, begin near the first part of the English “ay” sound and keep the tongue steady instead of gliding.

At the end of a word, for example in bitte (“please”), e is a schwa, a neutral “uh” sound, like the final syllable in the English pronunciation of “Canada”.

• i is short /ɪ/ in mit and long /iː/ in ihn. The long sound is also commonly written ie, as in nie, and occasionally ieh, as in sieht.
• o is short /ɔ/ in offen and long /oː/ in Ofen.
• u is short /ʊ/ in Mutter and long /uː/ in gut or Ruhe.
• y is often /yː/ or /ʏ/ in words of Greek origin, such as Typ or Gymnasium. Its pronunciation in newer loanwords varies, so learn words such as Hobby and Baby from audio rather than assuming the English sound is unchanged.

There are three “diphthongs” (double vowels) in German:

• eu and äu, as in Deutsch and Häuser, are /ɔʏ̯/. English “oy” is a useful approximation; keep the lips rounded as the tongue moves.
• ei and ai are /aɪ̯/, close to English “eye.” Think of the two ei spellings in Einstein. The spellings ey and ay also occur, especially in names.
• au, as in auch, is /aʊ̯/, close to English “ow.” The endpoint is a short back rounded sound; do not force it into the full long /uː/ of German gut.

How Do You Pronounce Ä, Ö, Ü, and ß in German?

In standard German orthography, the umlaut letters are ä, ö, and ü. Marks above e or i in a name may be a diaeresis or another language’s spelling convention rather than a German umlaut.

Umlauted vowels represent the “fronted” versions of the non-umlauted letters, meaning that, for example, “ä” is like “a” but with the tongue further forward in the mouth. Just remember that:

• ä is short /ɛ/ in Männer and long /ɛː/ or /eː/, depending on the standard variety and word, in examples such as spät.
• ö is short /œ/ in können and long /øː/ in schön. Start from an e-like tongue position and round your lips without adding an English-style glide.
• ü is short /ʏ/ in müssen and long /yː/ in grün. Start from an i-like tongue position and round your lips; compare your attempt with native audio rather than expecting one mouth trick to guarantee the sound.

Umlauts often indicate a grammatical change:

• An umlaut can distinguish a singular from its plural: Apfel means “apple” and Äpfel means “apples.” It is one plural pattern, not a rule for every noun.
• Some strong verbs change their stem vowel in the second- and third-person singular: ich fange an (“I start”), but du fängst an (“you start”).
• Diminutives with -chen or -lein often take an umlaut when the stem vowel allows it, as in Brot (“bread”) and Brötchen (“bread roll”). Learn the resulting word rather than applying a stress rule.

The umlauted diphthong äu (e.g. Fräulein) is pronounced identically to the German eu.

Sometimes “ä”, “ü” and “ö” are written as “ae”, “ue” and “oe”. For example, können (“to be able”) can be written koennen. This is the standard way to write umlauted vowels if, say, the computer you’re typing on doesn’t have a way to type umlauts.

How to Pronounce “ß” in German

The short answer: like an English “s”.

The full story: ß is called Eszett or scharfes S (“sharp S”). It is distinctive to German orthography and developed from historical letter combinations involving long s. Although it can resemble a B or the Greek letter beta (β), it represents a voiceless /s/ sound. The name Eszett combines the German letter names for s and z.

Swiss and Liechtenstein standard spelling uses ss instead of ß in ordinary words: Strasse rather than Straße. Imported proper names can still preserve their original spelling.

In Germany and Austria, “ß” is one of three ways to write the /s/ sound; the other two are “s” and “ss”.

The important point is that “ß” is pronounced like an “s”. Just remember which spelling is used for which word as you learn vocabulary; the pattern is more intuitive than the technical description makes it sound.

For a long time, ß had no standard capital counterpart, so Straße could become STRASSE in all capitals. Capital ẞ entered the official rules in 2017. Under the current official rules, both ẞ and SS are possible in all-capital writing; ẞ can preserve the distinction between names such as Weiß and Weiss.

The 1996 orthography reform changed the ss/ß pattern, but the Council for German Orthography did not yet exist; it was founded in 2004. The current official rule writes ß after a long vowel or diphthong and ss after a short vowel.

For example, the spelling of the word daß (“that”) was changed to dass. So you might still see the outdated spellings in older German texts.

What’s the Difference between -e and -er in German?

In many standard pronunciations, word-final -er is vocalized to [ɐ]. The r is not simply deleted: it changes the vowel quality, which is why -er still sounds different from final -e.

Final -e is usually the schwa [ə], while vocalized -er is [ɐ]. Compare meine /ˈmaɪ̯nə/ with meiner /ˈmaɪ̯nɐ/. Speakers with a consonantal r keep a clearer r sound, so you will hear regional variation.

This short lesson demonstrates the [ə] and [ɐ] contrast:

Watch Out For Non-Silent Letters!

German spelling usually gives you more pronunciation information than English spelling, but not every written letter has its own sound. The h in sehen, for example, helps mark vowel length or a syllable boundary rather than adding an /h/ sound. Still, English speakers often need to restore consonants that English would leave silent.

In particular, remember to:

• Say the “k” out loud in words that start with “kn-”, like Knie (“knee”).
• Say the “p” out loud in words that start with “ps-”, like Psychologie (“psychology”).
• Don’t drop the final “-e”; e.g. Mitte (“middle”) is pronounced “MITT-uh”, not “mitt”.

Loanwords are Often Exceptions to the Rule

German has many loanwords, and their pronunciation can range from close to the source language to fully adapted German. That makes word origin a useful clue, but not a rule.

For example, Ski is commonly pronounced /ʃiː/, while words such as Software mix familiar German sounds with a borrowed shape. Names, technical terms, and newer loans are good candidates for a dictionary check.

When a word does not fit the native patterns above, listen to more than one careful speaker and save the audio with the vocabulary item. That is safer than forcing every c, v, y, or final e through a single spelling rule.

Compound Words in German

German is famous for its long words, like Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzung, “speed limit”. These words look intimidating, but we actually do something similar in English.

In English you can combine two or more nouns to get a new noun or noun phrase. Sometimes we write the words separately (“music festival”, “flight attendant”), and sometimes we write it as a single word (“warlord”, “stockbroker”).

German compounds are normally written as one word. English “music festival,” for example, corresponds to Musikfestival. Longer compounds follow the same principle: Donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftskapitän can be read by separating its component nouns from right to left.

Some compounds use a connecting element. For example, Maus (“mouse”) and Falle (“trap”) form Mausefalle, with connecting -e-. Other common connectors include -s-, -n-, and -en-, but the choice belongs to the individual compound and is best learned with the word.

Compounding can place the same letter three times in a row because the original word stems remain visible. Examples include Schifffahrt (“shipping”) and Brennnessel (“stinging nettle”).

Quotation Marks in German

A common German quotation-mark style opens low and closes high. Books and publishers may also use inward-pointing guillemets, »like this«.

Arnold sagte: „Ich komme wieder.“
Arnold said, “I’ll be back.”

A Final Note on Pronunciation

To help you learn the German letter names, I recommend listening to the German Alphabet song:

The interjection juchhe! in the song is like “yippee!” or “hooray!” The line Zum Lernen ist es nie zu früh means “It’s never too early to learn.”

Now You Know the German Alphabet!

You do not need to memorize every pattern at once. Start with the letter names, short and long vowels, the two main ch sounds, and the spelling of ä, ö, ü, and ß. Then return to the regional notes and loanword exceptions as you meet them.

For more listening practice, see our GermanPod101 review, which explains the course’s strengths and limits. If you want a structured speaking plan with personal support, take a look at the Fluent in 3 Months Bootcamp.