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Spanish Grammar Guide

Spelling and Pronounciation

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Description

Main Rules for Spanish Spelling and Pronunciation
Spanish/English cognates
Homophones

An Overview of Spanish Spelling:

In general, Spanish spelling is consistent with pronunciation, meaning that the same letters are pronounced the same way across most contexts. This is good news for learners because it means that learning to spell and pronounce Spanish is relatively simple and transparent.

Main Rules for Spanish Spelling and Pronunciation

In Spanish, letters representing vowels are always pronounced (unlike in English). There are also no silent vowels in Spanish, except for the sequences qu and gui or gue that have a silent u. The following table lists the Spanish vowels, gives an example of a Spanish word, and also gives an example of an English word that has a similar vowel sound.

vowel	Spanish word	English word with same vowel sound
a	abierto 'open'	apple
e	veinte 'twenty'	eight
i	iglesia 'church'	eat
o	corto 'short'	open
u	azul 'blue'	glue
y	y 'and'	eat

Spanish consonants are fairly consistent with English, so only those that differ form English will be presented in the following table:

Spanish Consonant	Spanish word	English word with same sound	Notes
b and v	burro 'donkey' and vacaciones 'vacations'		both b and v are pronounced equally in Spanish; they sound like a b but with more air flow and friction
c	cero 'zero', coche 'car'	certify, cat	when c occurs before e or i it is pronounced like an s, in other contexts it is pronounced like a k
cc	acción 'action'	axe	double cc sounds like English x (ks)
g	gato 'cat', gente 'people'	go, hat	when g occurs before e or i it is pronounced something like an English h, though with more friction, in other contexts it is pronounced like a hard English g
gua, güe, güi	guapo 'handsome', vergüenza 'shame', lingüística 'linguistics'	Gwen	the sequence gua, güe, and güi are pronounced with a gw sound; other sequences of gu+vowel have a silent u
h	hora 'hour'		h is always silent in Spanish, just say the word as if it began with the following vowel
j	jardín 'garden'	hat	Spanish j is pronounced something like an English h, though with more friction/mouth closure
ll	llamo 'I call'	yummy	sounds like an English y, except in Argentina and Ecuador where it is pronounced like the g of genre
ñ	niño 'boy/child'	onion, canyon	the sound ñ occurs in English in the sequence ny and sometimes the sequence ni
qu	queso 'cheese'	kite	the sequence qu in Spanish is always pronounced like an English k, NOT like a kw sound as in English queen
r	pero 'but'	ladder, butter	the single r in Spanish is pronounced like the d or t that occurs in the middle of a word in English (a tap of the tongue on the roof of the mouth); when the single r occurs at the start of word, it is pronounced as a trill (see rr)
rr	perro 'dog', rosa 'rose/pink'		the rr and r at the beginning of a word is pronounced as a trill of the tongue (this may take some practice)
s	solo 'alone'	solo	the letter s has only one sound in Spanish, unlike English that has the unvoiced s as in solo and the voiced s (sounds like z) as in rose
y	y 'and', cayó* 'he fell'*	eat, you	y is a vowel in Spanish, or a consonant like English y
x	México, éxito 'success'	hat, exit	x is pronounced like English x (ks); in certain proper nouns (names), coming from Mexico, it is pronounced something like an English h, though with more friction/mouth closure; in other proper nouns, also from Mexico, it can be pronounced like an s or a sh
z	zebra 'zebra'	sorry	the letter z is always pronounced like s (i.e.: NO voicing like the English z); in Spain z is pronounced like English th in think

Accents, if present, always indicate the stress of a word in Spanish. Otherwise, the second last syllable of a word carries the stress (unless the word ends in "r", "z", or "l" in which case the last syllable of the word carries the stress), e.g.:

energía, práctica, versión
platos, problema, radio, hablan
hablar, vegetal, actriz

Spanish/English cognates

Be careful with words that mean the same, but have slightly different spellings in English and in Spanish. Even though the spelling is the same, keep in mind the pronunciation is likely different. Some common pairs of cognates are given in the following table:

English	Spanish	English	Spanish
apartment	apartamento departamento	invite	invitar
accompany	acompañar	interesting	interesante
activities	actividades	family	familia
aggressive	agresivo	important	importante
broccoli	brócoli	honor	honor
bicycle	bicicleta	list	lista
alcohol	alcohol	lesson	lección
advantage	ventaja	ocean	océano
blouse	blusa	paper	papel
exercise	ejercicio	music	música
effect	efecto	natural	natural
camouflage	camuflaje	object	objeto
double	doble	plans	planes
passport	pasaporte	television	televisión
different	diferente	problem	problema
examine	examinar	traffic	tráfico
elegant	elegante	restaurant	restaurante
energy	energía	radio	radio
group	grupo	uniform	uniforme
guide	guía	visit	visitar
history	historia	vote	votar
human	humano	secret	secreto

Homophones

Homophones are words that are pronounced the same, but have different spellings. These differences must be respected when writing. Some of the most common homophones in Spanish are presented below:

a ("to/at"); ha from haber ("to have + past participle")
calló from callar ("he/she silenced"); cayó from caer ("he/she fell down")
casa ("house"); caza ("hunt")
coser ("to sew"); cocer ("to cook")
de ("of/from"); dé subjunctive of dar ("I/he/she gives")
el ("the"); él ("he")
hola ("hello"); ola ("wave")
mi ("my"); mí ("me (object of preposition)")
si ("if"); sí ("yes")
bienes ("goods"); vienes from venir ("you come")
te ("you (object pronoun)"); té ("tea")
tu ("your"); tú ("you")
que ("that"); qué ("what")