The Spanish alphabet: letters, pronunciation and spelling in class

The 27 letters and their names

The pronunciation column gives the name of each letter in English sounds, stressed syllable in capitals. Treat it as a rough guide: the listen button gives you the real thing.

Spanish vowels are short and pure: e is a clean “eh”, never the “ay-ee” glide of English “say”, and o is “oh” without the “oo” at the end. Letter names are feminine: la hache, la eñe, dos erres.

Other names you will hear

The Spanish language academies recommend one name per letter, but traditional names are still in everyday use. None of them is a mistake.

What happened to ch, ll and rr?

Older textbooks and posters show 28, 29 or even 30 letters. They are out of date rather than wrong.

1. Ch and ll used to be letters. They had their own names, che and elle, and dictionaries filed every word beginning with ch after all the words in c.
2. 1994: new dictionary order. The Spanish language academies decided to file ch under c and ll under l, as in any other alphabet. Chocolate now comes before cielo, where it used to come after it.
3. 2010: out of the alphabet. The academies’ Ortografía of 2010 removed ch and ll from the list of letters. They are digraphs, like qu, gu and rr: two letters, one sound. People still call them che and elle (or doble ele) when they spell.
4. Rr was never an official letter. It appeared on some school charts as erre doble or doble erre, and that is still how people spell it aloud.
5. Ñ stays. It is a letter in its own right and comes after n: nudo, ñu, obra.

The 2010 Ortografía also recommended erre as the only name for r; the older ere for a single r has been dropped.

Letters that sound different from English

1. B and v sound the same. Both are a b: a full b after a pause or after m and n (vaca, un vaso), and a soft b with the lips barely touching between vowels (uva, lobo). This is why Spanish speakers ask ¿con be o con uve?
2. C, z and qu. C before a, o, u sounds like k (casa, cuatro). C before e and i, and z, sound like the th of “think” in most of Spain, and like s in Latin America, the Canary Islands and parts of Andalusia (cine, zapato). Qu is always k, with a silent u (queso, quince).
3. G and j. J, and g before e and i, are the throaty h of Scottish “loch” (jamón, gente). G before a, o, u is a hard g (gato). In gue and gui the u is silent (guitarra); with a diaeresis it is pronounced (pingüino, vergüenza).
4. H is always silent. Hola is “OH-lah”. The pair ch, though, is the ch of “church”: chocolate.
5. Ll and y. Most speakers today pronounce them the same, like the y of “yes” (pollo, playa). In Argentina and Uruguay they sound like the sh of “shop” or the s of “measure”. A minority, in some areas of Spain and the Andes, still keeps a separate ll sound.
6. Ñ is the ny of “canyon”, a word English borrowed from Spanish cañón.
7. R and rr. A single r between vowels is one quick tap (pero, but). Rr, and r at the start of a word or after l, n, s, is rolled (perro, dog; rosa; Enrique).
8. X is usually ks (examen, taxi). In some Mexican names it keeps an old spelling for the jota sound: México, Oaxaca.
9. K and w appear mainly in borrowed words (kilo, web). W usually sounds like English w; in a few older loans it is a b: in Spain wáter (toilet) is said BAH-ter.
10. Y as a vowel. On its own or at the end of a word, y sounds like i: y (and), hoy, rey.

Accents and other signs

• á, é, í, ó, ú: the written accent (la tilde) marks the stressed syllable. When spelling, say a con tilde or a acentuada.
• ü: the diaeresis (la diéresis), only in güe and güi: u con diéresis.
• ¿ ? and ¡ !: questions and exclamations open with an upside-down mark: abre interrogación, cierra interrogación.
• Capital letters keep their accents: ÁFRICA, Álvaro. The academies are clear on this.

The squiggle on ñ is part of the letter, not an accent: without it, año (year) becomes a rude word, which pupils never forget.

Spelling aloud: names and email addresses

• ¿Cómo se escribe?: How do you spell it? (literally “how is it written?”)
• ¿Cómo se deletrea tu apellido?: How do you spell your surname?
• ¿Me lo puedes deletrear?: Can you spell it for me?
• ¿Con be o con uve?, ¿Con hache o sin hache?: the two questions every Spanish speaker asks.
• mayúscula, minúscula: capital, lower case.
• todo junto: all one word; guion: hyphen; guion bajo: underscore.
• arroba: @; punto: dot; barra: slash; punto com: .com

To avoid confusion, people often add a word: be de Barcelona, uve de Valencia, ese de Sevilla.

Me llamo Harrison: hache, a, dos erres, i, ese, o, ene.My name is Harrison: H, A, double R, I, S, O, N.

Mi correo es sam.jones arroba ejemplo punto com.My email is sam.jones@ejemplo.com.

—¿Vaca se escribe con be? —No, con uve.“Is vaca spelt with a b?” “No, with a v.”

Typical mistakes of English-speaking learners

• English vowel names: saying “ee” for e, “eye” for i and “ay” for a. When a pupil spells an email address, this is the error you will hear most.
• G, j and h: “gee”, “jay” and “aitch” instead of ge, jota, hache.
• Sounding the h in hola or hablar.
• An English v in vaca or vivir.
• Ignoring ñ: “ano” for año, “Espana” for España.
• One r for two: pero and perro said the same way.
• Forgetting ¿ and ¡ at the start.

In class: spelling routines

Spelling aloud is a skill of its own. A daily minute keeps it alive long after the alphabet lesson.

1. Show a word: the word of the day, a pupil’s name, a town in the Spanish-speaking world.
2. One pupil spells it aloud in Spanish; the rest write it on mini whiteboards without looking.
3. Reveal the word and check the traps: be or uve, h, ñ, accents.
4. Reverse the roles: you spell a mystery word, the class writes it and says what it means.
5. Pass the role of speller to a different pupil each day.

Quick games work well alongside: el ahorcado (hangman), a “be or uve?” quick-fire round, and the traditional Spanish “I spy”, Veo, veo: —Veo, veo. —¿Qué ves? —Una cosita. —¿Y qué cosita es? —Empieza por la… pe.

Adapting to your class

• A1Recognise and say the letters; spell your first name: Me llamo Ella: e, ele, ele, a.
• A2Spell a surname, a town, an email address; ask ¿Cómo se escribe?
• B1Spelling rules: b or v, g or j, c, z or qu; dictation of unfamiliar words
• B2Stress and written accents, and homophones: hola / ola, tubo / tuvo, vaca / baca

At KS2, a song and the vowels are enough to start. From KS3 to GCSE, spelling names and streets is a classic of listening practice.

Frequently asked questions