El Alfabeto: Your Guide To The Spanish Alphabet

The Spanish alphabet is known as the “abecedario” or “alfabeto” and it is made up of 27 letters: 22 consonants and 5 vowels. It uses the Latin script and its words are simple to pronounce since they are easily implied based on their spelling.

For example, in the movie When Harry Met Sally, Harry tells Sally that he was up last night watching Leave it to Beaver in Spanish. Because of that show, he learned the sentences “Buenos días, Señor Cleaver. ¿Dónde están Wallace y Theodore?” Spanish is highly phonetic, meaning if you see a word, there is a huge probability you can pronounce it just right.

Important Rules to Remember

• The letter H is always silent (unless preceded by C or S).
• The letters B and V sound exactly the same in most dialects.
• The letter Ñ is a unique member of the Spanish alphabet.
• Every word that starts with R is always trilled or "rolled."
• There are several ways to name the letter W (e.g., doble ve, uve doble).