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What's the German alphabet like?

The German alphabet has 26 letters plus 3 umlauts.
You may well have to spell out your name and perhaps your address in German. Here is the alphabet and how to pronounce it

- right click and choose 'save target as'

What's significant about the German alphabet?

• Döts and a sharp s

  The modern German alphabet's based on the Latin alphabet, consisting of 26 base letters. A little German Extrawurst, special treatment, has been added in the form of four more letters called die Umlaute Ìýä, ö, ü and the Ìýß, sharp s, which is pronounced as double s, eg. in Ìý²ú±ð¾±ÃŸ±ð²Ô, to bite, or
  Ìýder Gruß, greeting. You'll only ever see it in lower case as words never start with a ß, and it's not used in Swiss German, which opts for double s instead.

• Strange sounds

  The German e, eg. Ìýder Engel, angel, and i, eg. Ìýdie Ironie, irony, can be tricky and are sometimes easily mixed up by English speakers. The e sounds like the vowel in English 'egg', keeping your lips widely spread. The German i sounds like the 'ee' in the English word 'feet'. The German final e is never silent, but very short, e.g. Ìýdie Meile, mile, or Ìýdie Kasette, casette.

  Practise the German vowel combination ei, for example
  Ìýdas Ei, egg, which rhymes with the English 'lie'. Don't confuse it with the the German ie, which sounds like 'ee'. Otherwise the action ²õ³¦³ó¾±±ðß±ð²Ô, to shoot, becomes ²õ³¦³ó±ð¾±ÃŸ±ð²Ô, to defecate, which could cause some embarrassment!

  The good news is that, with only a few exceptions, German consonants are very similar to their English equivalents.

  Sch, like in Ìýdie Schule, school, sounds like sh. Ch after a vowel sounds quite similar to the Scottish loch, as in
  Ìýdas Loch, which is not a lake, but hole in German.

  The letters x and y (Ypsilon) occur almost exclusively in words of Greek origin, eg. Ìýdas Xylophon or Ìýdas System. Sometimes y and i represent the same sound, for example in surnames:
  ÌýMeier, Meyer.

• Standard German

  The equivalent of Queen's English is Hochdeutsch, lit. 'High German', which is regarded as "proper" spoken German.
  On the other hand, there are different varieties of standard German. The main distinction is between Austrian, German and Swiss German. For example ÌýJanuar, january, is Ìý´³Ã¤²Ô²Ô±ð°ù in Austrian German.

  Local dialects are numerous and widely spread. A speaker of Plattdeutsch from the North of Germany would struggle to hold a conversation with a speaker of Bavarian from the South of Germany, who would on his part have less problems understanding someone speaking in an Austrian dialect.

  As the result of German migration, a number of German dialects are spoken in North- and South-America, eg. Pennsylvania Dutch, which isn't Dutch at all but a German dialect that indicates how German was spoken in the 18th century, when their ancestors left Germany.

• Email and website conventions

  When giving an email or website address the conventions are:
  Ìý@Ìýat
  Ìý.ÌýPunkt, dot
  Ìý/Ìý³§³¦³ó°ùä²µ²õ³Ù°ù¾±³¦³ó, forward slash
  Ìý-ÌýBindestrich, hyphen