LingoflyValencian alphabet
The Valencian alphabet is the Valencian Latin alphabet: 27 letters. 27 letters: the Latin alphabet plus ç — and vowels that always sound the same. The characters are grouped: the signature signs, five vowels, five sounds, letters that deceive. Every character on this page can be played: the sound is stored as a file and does not depend on the voices installed on your system.
All 27 letters in one list
a, b, c, ç, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z
The tables on this page also include ll, l·l, ny, rr, ss, tx, tz and ig: they are needed for reading but do not count as letters of the alphabet.
The signature signs
ç is the only letter with a cedilla, l·l the only mid-word dot in Europe. The letter pairs are not letters, but without them you cannot read so much as a menu.
- Ç çs as in "sun", in any positionce trencada
- Ny nyny as in "canyon"enya
- Ll lla soft ly, one whole soundella
- L·L l·la long doubled l, heldela geminada
- X xch or sh at the start of a word; ks in borrowingsics
- Tx txch as in "church"te ics
- Tz tza voiced dz, one fused soundte zeta
- Ig igch after i, word-final onlyi ge
Five vowels, five sounds
The great mercy of Valencian: every vowel sounds the same stressed or unstressed. A final -o never turns into oo, a final -a never fades. What makes the central norm hard on the ear simply is not here. Think of the vowels of Spanish casa — steady all the way through.
Letters that deceive
This is where Valencian parts ways with Spanish. j is a j as in "jam", in some dialects the s of "measure". S between vowels voices to z, and h is silent. Yet hui and huit are not written without it.
- H hsilent, never pronouncedhac
- J jj as in "jam", or zhjota
- G gg as in "go"; j or zh before e and ige
- V vv, or bve baixa
- B bb as in "best"; p at the end of a wordbe alta
- C ck as in "kite"; s before e and ice
- Q qk, always followed by ucu
- S ss as in "sun"; z between vowelsesse
- Ss sss as in "sun", always voicelessessa doble
- R ra tapped r — and final -r is pronouncederre
- Rr rra long trilled rerra doble
- Z zz as in "zoo"zeta
- Y yy as in "yes", loanwords onlyi grega
Read as they look
Nothing to learn: the sound is exactly the one you expect.
What to know about this Latin script
There are 27 letters: the Latin alphabet plus ç. The spelling is shared with the central norm — the two write with the same letters and part ways in sound. The course follows the Valencian norm: unstressed vowels never fade, a final -r is pronounced. The j is a j as in "jam", in some dialects the s of "measure". Stress is marked with an acute (é, í, ó, ú) or a grave (à, è, ò). These are not separate letters, only marks over the same 27.
Where this script came from and why it looks the way it does
Valencian is written with the same letters as Catalan: the common orthography was signed back in 1932 in Castelló, and the AVL academy, founded in 1998, built its norm on it. What differs is not the writing but the sound: unstressed vowels do not fade here.
«Normes de Castelló», Castelló de la Plana, 1932; Dictamen de l'AVL sobre el valencià, 2002
Test yourself
Five characters at random. No need to answer aloud — just pick; the answer appears at once.
- Which character reads as “a as in "father", never "uh"”?
In the standard casa sounds "kaza" to the very last letter. Many local accents turn the final -a into an e or o sound, but the norm keeps a
- Which character reads as “s as in "sun", in any position”?
The only letter with a cedilla tail: caça is hunting, comença is "it begins". It sounds like c before e and i, but it shows up anywhere in a word
- Which character reads as “f as in "fun"”?
An ordinary f
- Which character reads as “j as in "jam", or zh”?
València, jornada, gent — the same sound everywhere; no kh ever appears in it
- Which character reads as “a soft ly, one whole sound”?
Soft at the start of a word and at the end: llet is milk, cavall is a horse. Casual city speech may turn it into a y, but the norm is ly
How to learn letters so they stay
You cannot learn a table by staring at it. What works: see a character, try to recall its sound, get it wrong, see the right answer — and come back to that character in a day, not in an hour.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- 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.
That is why the alphabet in the app is learned a few characters at a time, not all at once: nobody holds 27 signs in one sitting.
Frequently asked
How many letters in the Valencian alphabet?
27 letters — the Valencian Latin alphabet: a, b, c, ç, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z. The tables on this page also include ll, l·l, ny, rr, ss, tx, tz and ig: they are needed for reading but do not count as letters of the alphabet. The characters have capital and small forms.
Can I listen to how the Valencian letters sound?
Yes. 35 signs on this page have sound: click a character to hear it. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.
How long does it take to learn the Valencian alphabet?
A few characters a day — one to two weeks, if you come back to what you covered. The whole alphabet crammed in an evening is remembered for an evening: without reviews the next day and three days later, the characters are almost entirely gone.
Where to start: letters or words?
Both at once: you can already read this script, so a separate letters course is not needed — a reference table is enough.