Swedish/Alphabet

Return to Introduction to Swedish.

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The Swedish alphabet contains 28 letters:

Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Xx Yy Zz Åå Ää Öö

Notes
The last three letters, Å, Ä, and Ö, are regarded as distinct letters, separate from A and O. Whereas in English you might use the term "A - Z", in Swedish it would be "A - Ö". Unlike in English, Y is always a vowel, except in the case of some loanwords. For a time, W was part of the alphabet, treated as a variation of V, but it is no longer a part of it (it is still used however, in some loanwords).

Special Characters

On a PC:

Alt+0229 = å
Alt+0197 = Å
Alt+0228 = ä

Alt+0196 = Ä
Alt+0246 = ö
Alt+0214 = Ö

On a Mac:

Option+a = å
Option+A = Å
Option+u to get ¨ then type a = ä
Option+u to get ¨ then type A = Ä
Option+u to get ¨ then type o = ö
Option+u to get ¨ then type O = Ö

If you don't manage to get these characters the standard way is to substiture å with aa, ä with ae, and ö with oe.

The Vowels

Vovels are divided into hard and soft vovels:

The hard vowels are: a o u å

The soft vowels are: e i y ä ö

When reading new Swedish words you should pay attention to if the vovels are short or long. Each vovel has both a long and a short phonetic variant. The basic rule is that a vovel is short if it is followed by more than one consonant.

Examples of words with long vowels:

Tal, sko, lur, vår, stel, bil, dyr, säl, öl

Examples of words with short vowels:

Tall, troll, surr, sånt, tenn, svinn, pynt, fält, trött

The Consonats

Most cononants can be doubled. k, is doubled with ck (Like in rock n' roll.) The consonant c, sounds like s when not combined with k (Like the first c in bicycle). C does not occur doubled. z, q, and w are very uncommon letters but are used in names. m is not doubled at end of words with some exceptions.

Examples of words with doubled consonants:

flabb, ledd, klaff, ragg, back, pall, damm, spinn, kupp, pirr, triss, titt

Stress

Normaly the stress is put on the first vowel. The tonality is important in Swedish.

Tonality

Both nita and niten has the stress on the vowel i. However the tonality differs.

Exercise

Pronounce the following Swedish words.

1. skal, sno, tur, kår, ven, mil, syl, när, bör

2. stall, stopp, lupp, sådd, ett, stins, skyll, ärr, börs

3. vara, bliva, heta, kallas, äta, dricka, festa, leka

4. bilen, vägen, äpplet, trädet, smaken, tiken