Spanish Pronunciation Overview

Level: A1. Good news for your ears: Spanish is spelled almost exactly as it sounds. Once you learn the five vowels and a short list of consonants, you can read a new word and say it correctly. This page shows you what to focus on first.

By the end of this page you can…

…say the five Spanish vowels cleanly, name the consonants English speakers get wrong, place the stress correctly, and use the audio here to practise.

Spelling matches sound

Unlike English, Spanish spelling is a reliable map of its sound. Each letter almost always makes the same sound, so once you know the rules you rarely have to guess. The main things to learn are the five vowels, a handful of consonants, and where the stress falls.

A single distinct sound is called a phoneme. Spanish has only five vowel sounds — far fewer than English — and they stay the same in every word, stressed or not. That one fact removes most of the guesswork.

The five vowels

Learn these once and they never change:

Two vowels together are each still pronounced, often gliding into one syllable: bien (well) is “byen”, not two slow beats.

The consonants to watch

Most consonants are close to English. Spend your effort on these:

• j, and g before e/i — a strong, throaty h from the back of the mouth: jamón (ham), gente (people).
• rr versus r — rr is a rolled trill (perro, dog); a single r between vowels is a quick tap, almost like the “dd” in “ladder” (pero, but). These two change the meaning.
• ñ — “ny” as in canyon: año (year), niño (child). Without the tilde, ano is a different word.
• ll and y — both usually sound like English “y” in “yes”: llamar (to call), yo (I). Regional variation exists (see below).
• h — always silent: hola (hello) is “OH-lah”, hora (hour) is “OH-rah”.
• b and v — the same sound, a soft b: vaca (cow) and bola (ball) start alike.
• c and z — before e/i (and z anywhere) they are “th” in most of Spain and “s” in Latin America: cinco (five), zapato (shoe).

How to say it

Four habits fix most beginner errors:

• Vowels: short and pure — never let como drift to “coh-oo-mo”.
• rr: let the tongue tip bounce on the ridge behind your teeth; practise with perro and carro.
• j: push air from the throat as in a strong “h”; practise with trabajo and mujer.
• Single r: a light tap, not an English r; pero is one quick flick of the tongue.

Listen and repeat with the audio

Press play on each word, then say it back. These contrast the sounds above.

Stress and the written accent

Spanish stress follows simple defaults, and the accent mark handles the rest:

• Words ending in a vowel, -n or -s are stressed on the second-to-last syllable: casa (CA-sa), hablan (HA-blan).
• Words ending in any other consonant are stressed on the last syllable: hotel (ho-TEL), reloj (re-LOJ).
• A written accent marks every exception and shows exactly where to push: café (ca-FÉ), lápiz (LÁ-piz), teléfono (te-LÉ-fo-no).

Regional variation

Spanish sounds slightly different across the Spanish-speaking world, and all of it is standard:

• c/z: “th” (distinción) in most of Spain; “s” (seseo) across Latin America and parts of southern Spain.
• ll and y: merged for most speakers (yeísmo); in some areas ll keeps a distinct sound.
• s at the end of a syllable: softened or dropped (to an “h”) in the Caribbean and southern Spain.

Pick one accent to imitate at first, then simply understand the others. None is more “correct”.

Quick recap before you practise.

Practice

Quiz

Next

• Build words into sentences with the regular -AR verbs lesson
• Browse every topic in the Spanish grammar section
• New here? Start with Start Learning Spanish Here