Ґ ґ — ge
«ge» is a consonant of Ukrainian, the “Ukrainian Cyrillic” script, read as “hard g as in "go"”. An ordinary hard g as in "go" — but you will meet it rarely. For example, in the word “ґудзик” — button. The Ukrainian alphabet has 33 letters in total. A rare letter kept for a handful of words like ganok (porch) and gudzyk (button). Almost every g-sound you hear is written with the breathy h-letter instead. It appears, for example, in the word “ґрунт” — soil.
In short
| Character | Ґ ґ |
| Name | ge |
| Sound | hard g as in "go" |
| What it is | a consonant |
In our course the character comes 5th of 33, its neighbours in the course are г and д, appears in 5 words of this site.
How it sounds
An ordinary hard g as in "go" — but you will meet it rarely
The character in a word
A lone character is hard to remember: memory holds on to meaning, and a letter has none. The word it stands in provides that anchor.
- ґудзикbutton
The character in the “letters english never gave you” group
The heart of the alphabet lesson. The pair y and i looks almost identical but sounds different — one is a pulled-back i, the other a pure ee — and mixing them up mixes up "you" and "no". Add ye and yi, two letters that pack a y-glide plus a vowel into one sign.
Words with this character
How to remember this character
A single letter is the hardest thing to remember: memory has nothing to hold on to — a character has no meaning. A three-step loop works: see the character, try to recall the sound (for «ge» it is “hard g as in "go"”, as in the word “ґудзик”), see the right answer.
And come back to it the next day, not in an hour: a check a day or two later beats a check the same day. Nobody holds the whole alphabet — 33 letters — at once.
- It is better to test yourself the next day than at the end of the same session. That is why a word comes back to you tomorrow.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · g = 0.82 when tested a day or two later, against 0.56 on the same day.
- Studying a little every day gets more into your head than spending the same total time in one sitting.checked many timesDonovan & Radosevich, 1999, Journal of Applied Psychology 84(5) · 63 studies compared, difference d = 0.46 — a sizeable figure for a learning effect.
Frequently asked
How does the Ukrainian character ґ read?
As “hard g as in "go"” — it is a consonant of the “Ukrainian Cyrillic” script. An ordinary hard g as in "go" — but you will meet it rarely. For example, in the word “ґудзик” — button.
What is the letter ґ called?
Ge. A character's name and its sound are different things in the Ukrainian script: it is called “ge” and reads as “hard g as in "go"”. Learn the second one: the name only helps when the alphabet is recited aloud.
What can ґ be confused with?
A rare letter kept for a handful of words like ganok (porch) and gudzyk (button). Almost every g-sound you hear is written with the breathy h-letter instead. Similar characters are best studied side by side and deliberately compared: learned on different days, they stay separate and get mixed up at their first meeting inside a word.