The German Alphabet and Pronunciation

When to write ß and when ss

ß follows a long vowel or a double vowel: Straße, groß, heißen, Fuß. ss follows a short vowel: Fluss, Kuss, essen, Wasser. If you cannot type ß, ss is understood everywhere and is the official spelling in Switzerland.

It only ever appears lowercase in normal writing, since no German word starts with it. A capital form exists since 2017 but you will rarely see it.

Spelling your name on the phone

Germans spell out loud with a fixed word per letter, A wie Anton, B wie Berta, and it is worth learning the list, because a hotel, a Bürgeramt or a call centre will expect you to use it and will use it back at you.

The official table was changed to city names in 2022 (A wie Aachen, B wie Berlin), but everyday Germans still use the old first names below, and both are understood.

• Wilson: W wie Wilhelm, I wie Ida, L wie Ludwig, S wie Samuel, O wie Otto, N wie Nordpol.How you would spell Wilson on the phone.
• Können Sie das bitte buchstabieren?Could you spell that, please?

The four sounds English speakers get wrong

ch has two sounds and neither is English ch. After a, o, u and au it is the rasp of Scottish loch: Bach, Buch, auch. After e, i, ä, ö, ü and consonants it is softer, like a strongly whispered h in huge: ich, nicht, Milch, Kirche.

r is made in the back of the throat, close to a light gargle, never with the tongue tip. At the end of a word -er relaxes into a plain uh: Mutter is MOOT-tuh, Lehrer is LAIR-uh.

ü and ö do not exist in English. For ü, say ee and push your lips forward into a tight circle without moving your tongue. For ö, do the same starting from the e of bed. Practise on fünf and schön; both are on every menu.

A final b, d or g is said as p, t or k. Tag is tahk, Hund is hoont, halb is halp. The spelling keeps the soft letter; the sound does not.

• Ich möchte ein Buch.I would like a book: soft ch, then the loch ch.
• Der Lehrer fährt nach Nürnberg.The teacher is driving to Nuremberg: three r sounds, one ü, one final g.

Long vowel or short vowel

Every vowel comes in a long and a short version, and the spelling tells you which. A doubled consonant after the vowel makes it short: Mutter, Bett, kommen. An h after the vowel, or a doubled vowel, makes it long: Sohn, Bahn, Boot, Tee. ie is always long.

A single consonant after the vowel usually means long: Name, Leben, gut. This is the difference between Stadt, city, and Staat, state, and between offen, open, and Ofen, oven.

• die Stadt, der Staatthe city, the state: short a, then long a
• offen, der Ofenopen, the oven: short o, then long o

Where the stress goes

German stresses the first syllable of native words: MUT-ter, AR-beit, FREI-tag. The unstressed prefixes be-, ge-, er-, ver-, zer- and ent- never take the stress: be-GIN-nen, ver-STE-hen, ent-SCHUL-di-gung.

Separable prefixes do take it: AUF-ste-hen, AN-ru-fen. Loanwords keep their foreign stress, which is why Musik, Natur and Student are stressed at the end.