Lesson 1: Spanish Alphabet & Pronunciation

Spanish pronunciation is the great gift of the language: unlike English or French, Spanish is spelled almost exactly as it sounds. Learn a handful of rules once and you can read any word aloud correctly, even one you have never seen.

What you will learn in this lesson

Ana walks you through the eight sounds that trip up English speakers: the ñ, the double ll and rr, the silent h, the throaty j, and the letters z, v and c whose values differ from English. Each comes with a real word you already half-recognise, so the rule and the example lock in together.

• ñ (eñe) 🇪🇸 — ‘ny’ sound, as in España
• ll (elle) 🔑 — ‘y’ sound, as in llave (key)
• rr (erre) 🐕 — rolled r, as in perro (dog)
• h (hache) 🤫 — always silent, as in hola
• j (jota) 🍖 — throaty h, as in jamón
• z (zeta) 👟 — ‘th’ or ‘s’, as in zapato
• v (uve) 🍷 — sounds like b, as in vino
• c + e/i 🎬 — ‘th’ or ‘s’, as in cine

Why Spanish pronunciation matter

Pronunciation is the foundation everything else sits on. If you learn a word with the wrong sounds, you will carry that error into every sentence and native speakers will hesitate before understanding you. Getting these eight rules right in your first lesson means every word you learn afterwards is stored correctly the first time.

Practice questions

The interactive card above ends with a short quiz. Here are the questions so you can review them afterwards — try to answer before checking the word in brackets.

• The letter “h” in “hola” is… (Silent)
• Which pair makes the rolled sound in “perro”? (rr)
• How is “ll” in “llave” pronounced? (like y)
• The “v” in “vino” sounds closest to… (b)

How to practise

Read each example word aloud three times, exaggerating the new sound. Repeat the card once a day for three days: short, frequent sessions beat one long session. Every completed lesson earns you 10 Mondi, and finishing the quiz earns 20 more.

Continue with the rest of the Learn to speak Spanish course on Mondosol, or read more background on Wikipedia.