How to use the Russian alphabet?

The Russian alphabet is not Latin-based, which might be intriguing and off-putting for learners at the same time. There are 33 letters in it, some look very similar to English ones (which does not mean they always represent similar sounds), and some look very different. The good news is, once you know what sounds the letters stand for, and familiarize yourself with a few basic pronunciation rules, reading in Russian is a piece of cake.

Would you like to know what sounds the letter Я, Ж, or Ф represent? Follow me, and you’ll be able to read any text in Russian out loud (even if you don’t understand a word in it)!

The Russian alphabet is a set of 33 letters that are used to read and write Russian. The modern Russian alphabet is based on the Cyrillic script which dates back to the 9th century. Believed to be designed by Saints Cyril and Methodius and their disciples, Cyrillic was spread among various Slavic peoples together with Christianity. Today, Cyrillic script serves as a base for writing in Russian, Belarusian, Bulgarian, Serbian, Ukrainian, and other languages.

Let’s now take a look at the 33 letters of the Russian alphabet, what they are called, and how they are used in words.

Some of the sounds made by Russian letters are common sounds in English, for example, к[k], м[m], н[n], ч[ch], с[s], в[v], з[z], л[l].

Other Russian letters represent sounds that are present in English, but they are pronounced a little differently when you're speaking Russian, for instance:

• Russian р[r] is rolled unlike the English one.

• б[b] and п[p] are less “explosive” than English ones.

• х[kh] is more intense and comes from the back of one’s throat, in comparison to the English “h” which is basically just a puff of air.

• т[t] and д[d] are pronounced closer to front teeth.

There are some other sounds in Russian that do not exist in English at all: ц[ts], щ[shch], and ы[y]. You should probably hear them to master them.

Here are some other important (and curious!) things you need to know about the letters in the Russian alphabet:

• There are no words in Russian which begin with ы, ь, and ъ, so these letters do not have capital versions.

• Some of the most frequently-used letters are о, е, а, и, н, т, с.

• Some of the most rarely-used letters are ъ, ё, ф, щ, э, ц, ю.

• The letter Ёё is often written/typed as Ее.

• The last letter of the alphabet, я[ya], is also a first person pronoun “I”. When someone acts selfishly or talks too much about themselves, people may say “Я” - последняя буква алфавита.

What does Russian cursive look like?

Russians hardly ever use block letters (or print letters) when they write longhand. All Russians learn cursive, or handwriting, at school, and people use it throughout their lives. To understand any handwritten document, such as a note, a birth certificate, or a graffiti, you need to know what Russian letters look like when they are written by hand.

Although there are great personal variations of letter styles, slope, etc., here is an example or handwritten Russian letters and a short text:

The text says: “Hi! I heard you started to learn Russian. Is that true? I hope it’ll work out well. Good luck!”

Although there are 10 vowel letters in the Russian alphabet, they actually represent only 6 vowel sounds: а[a], э[e], и[ee], о[о], у[oo], ы[y]. Four letters, е, ё, ю, and я, actually stand for a combination of two sounds: y + vowel (е[ye], ё[yo], ю[yu], я[ya]).

One important thing to know about the vowel letters in Russian is that they may change the pronunciation of the preceding consonant. Five vowel letters are called “hard vowels” because the consonant that comes before them remains hard (receiving its "normal" pronunciation). Five other vowels are called “soft vowels” because the consonant that comes before them becomes soft, or "palatalized."

To give you an idea of what “soft consonant” means, you sort of insert a short “y” (as in “you”) between the consonant and the following vowel, for example:

Most consonants in Russian can be hard (as they appear in the alphabet) or soft. This characteristic of a consonant depends on what comes after it. Consonants become soft, or palatalized:

• Before the vowels и[ee], e[ye], ё[yo], ю[yu], я[ya], e.g.:

  • мята[myaTA](mint)

  • лёд[lyot](ice)

  • боль[bol^y](pain)

  • петь[pyet^y](to sing)

• Sometimes before other soft consonants:

  • честь[ches^yt^y](honor)

  • здесь[z^ydyes^y]

When you pronounce a soft consonants, the middle part of your tongue will move a bit upwards, closer to the hard palate. To give some English examples of this contrast:

• [k] is hard in “car” and soft in “keen”

• [t] is hard in “tall” and soft in “teenager”

It’s important to pronounce soft and hard consonant correctly in Russian because this may affect the meaning of a word:

Some consonants in Russian are always hard or always soft regardless of what letter/sound comes after them:

Reading in Russian is relatively straightforward. All you need to learn apart from the alphabet is a few basic rules.

Let's review what we've learned:

• The Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters. Some look similar to English and some are very different. Each letter and the sound it represents has to be memorized.

• Handwriting in Russian looks quite different from typed texts.

• Russian vowel letters come in 5 pairs of ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ vowels.

• Russian consonants can be voiced or unvoiced, hard or soft.

• Reading in Russian relies heavily on the alphabet and a few basic rules:

  • Vowel reduction

  • Assimilation of consonants

  • Pronunciation of consonant clusters and some letter combinations

Don’t hesitate, try out reading in Russian now!