The Turkish alphabet: 29 letters and how to read them

Turkish is read as it is written: each letter stands for a single sound, and that sound does not change from word to word. Anyone who learns the alphabet and the pronunciation of the letters can therefore read correctly even words whose meaning they do not know. In this article I cover the 29 letters, the letter pairs learners confuse most often and the pronunciation of soft g.

1. 29 letters: 8 vowels, 21 consonants

The Turkish alphabet uses Latin letters and has 29 of them.

• Vowels (8): a, e, ı, i, o, ö, u, ü
• Consonants (21): b, c, ç, d, f, g, ğ, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, ş, t, v, y, z

The letters q, w, x of the English alphabet do not exist in Turkish. Instead, Turkish has ç, ğ, ı, ö, ş, ü.

Letter	Name	Sounds like	Example word
A a	a	sun	araba (car)
B b	be	bus	bebek (baby)
C c	ce	jar	cam (glass)
Ç ç	çe	chat	çorap (sock)
D d	de	door	dalga (wave)
E e	e	egg	elma (apple)
F f	fe	face	fare (mouse)
G g	ge	garden	gözlük (glasses)
Ğ ğ	yumuşak ge	no sound of its own	dağ (mountain)
H h	he	hat	hediye (gift)
I ı	ı	cousin	ırmak (river)
İ i	i	internet	İstanbul
J j	je	pleasure	jandarma (gendarmerie)
K k	ke	kite	kapı (door)
L l	le	lamb	lamba (lamp)
M m	me	mother	masa (table)
N n	ne	nest	nehir (river)
O o	o	orange	otel (hotel)
Ö ö	ö	German ö (schön)	öğrenci (student)
P p	pe	pen	portakal (orange)
R r	re	rose	radyo (radio)
S s	se	soccer	sandalye (chair)
Ş ş	şe	shoe	şemsiye (umbrella)
T t	te	train	tren (train)
U u	u	book	uçak (plane)
Ü ü	ü	French u (tu)	üzüm (grape)
V v	ve	van	vazo (vase)
Y y	ye	yellow	yüzük (ring)
Z z	ze	zebra	zeytin (olive)

Note the names of the letters: consonants are said with e (be, ce, de). Abbreviations are read with these letter names too: THY (Türk Hava Yolları, Turkish Airlines) “te-he-ye”, PTT (Posta ve Telgraf Teşkilatı, the Turkish postal service) “pe-te-te”.

Pay special attention to c: in Turkish it is always read like the English j in “jar”, never like “k” or “s”: cam “jam”.

2. The logic: one letter, one sound

Turkish has no silent letters. If you read every letter of a word in order, you say the word correctly: te-le-fon, o-to-büs, ü-ni-ver-si-te. The letter h is also pronounced everywhere: hava, kahve, sabah.

The only exception is ğ: it has no sound of its own and is read according to the vowel before it (section 4).

3. The letters learners confuse most often

In the pairs below, a single letter changes the meaning of the word. That is why it is important to tell these letters apart.

Letters	Example	Meaning
ı / i	kır / kir	countryside / dirt
o / ö	ol / öl	be! / die!
u / ü	un / ün	flour / fame
c / ç	cam / çam	glass / pine
s / ş	kas / kaş	muscle / eyebrow

ı and i are two different letters. Both are said with the lips spread; the difference is in the tongue: for dotless ı the tongue is pulled back, for dotted i it is forward. Their capitals are also different: the capital of ı is I, and the capital of i is İ: Isparta, İzmir.

ö and ü are said with rounded lips, like o and u, but with the tongue forward.

4. Soft g (ğ)

“Yumuşak ge” has no sound of its own. It follows two rules:

1. It never begins a word. No Turkish word starts with ğ.
2. It lengthens the vowel before it: dağ “daa”, ağaç “aaach”, yağmur “yaamur”, soğuk “sook”, öğretmen “ööretmen”.

Do not read ğ as “g”: dağ is said “daa”, not “dag”.

5. The circumflex (^): kâr and kar

In some words you will see a circumflex (^) over a vowel. It shows that the vowel is read a little longer or softer, and sometimes it separates two words: kar (snow) / kâr (profit), hala (aunt, father’s sister) / hâlâ (still). There are few such words; at the beginning it is enough to learn them by hearing them.

6. The R sound

In Turkish, r is said with the tip of the tongue, with a light trill. At the end of a word it sounds softer, almost like a whisper: bir, var, kar. I explain this sound in a separate video: The R sound.

How to study the alphabet

Instead of memorizing the letters one by one, work with words. Read the words in the table above aloud, then repeat them with me in the video. In part 1 of the alphabet videos we practise the sounds of the letters, and in part 2 we practise words; say them yourself in the pauses.

Test yourself

4 questions

1. 01How many letters are there in the Turkish alphabet?

   262933

   Answer:29. 8 vowels and 21 consonants, 29 letters in total.

2. 02Which letter does not exist in Turkish?

   çğw

   Answer:w. q, w and x are not in the Turkish alphabet.

3. 03How is the word "dağ" read?

   dagdaaday

   Answer:daa. ğ is not pronounced; it lengthens the vowel before it.

4. 04What is the capital form of "i"?

   IİÍ

   Answer:İ. The capital of dotted i is also dotted: İzmir, İstanbul.

Next step

Once you know the letters, it is time for the vowels: in Turkish, vowels decide the form of the suffixes. Read about vowel harmony in section 2 of the grammar guide. If you have trouble with the sound of a letter, ask me.