±«Óătv

Just like in English, Spanish has its own sounds and ways to pronounce letters.

Spanish uses the same five vowels as English: a, e, i, o and u.

Listen to the clips below to hear how the vowels are pronounced in Spanish.

Here are some examples of how to use the vowel sounds when pronouncing Spanish words:

VowelExampleEnglish
aspider
eelephant
iisland
oeleven
uone

Exception sounds

Spanish is an exciting language to learn but there are a few exception sounds you need to be aware of:

ñ - This is pronounced as ‘ny’

- Spain

ll - This is pronounced as a ‘y’

- my name is


v - This is pronounced as a ‘b’

- twenty

j - This is pronounced as a ‘h’

- June

h - This letter is always silent

- hamburger

Cognates

You might have also noticed that in Spanish many of the words look or sound like they would in English.

Here are some examples:

- garage

- guitar

- chocolate

The Spanish alphabet

The Spanish alphabet has many of the same letters as the English alphabet but some are pronounced differently.

Have a look at the table to see Spanish alphabet in full:

LetterName of letter in Spanish
aah
bbay
ctheh
ddeh
eeh
fefeh
gheh
hacheh
Iee
jhota
kkah
leleh
memeh
neneh
ñenyay
ooh
ppeh
qcuh
rere
sessay
tteh
uuhh
vuuveh
wuuveh dobleh
xekis
yye
ztheta

You can learn about Spanish pronunciation here.