German Alphabets
There are 30 letters in the German alphabets. German alphabets share the English 26 alphabets and in addition there are 3 umlaute (specific to German language) and one special letter (specific to country)
"The letters" in German language are called "die Buchstaben". Let us take a look in to the pronunciation of each of these German alphabets.
Alphabet Pronunciation
a - ah
b - bay
c - tceh
d - day
e - eh
f - eff
g - gay
h - haa
i - ie
j - yot
k - ka
l - ell
m - emm
n - enn
o - o
p - peh
q - ku
r - err
s - ess
t - teh
u - u
v - fau
w - way
x - iks
y - ypsilon
z - tzet
ä - eye
ö - eyo
ü - eyu
and speical character
ẞ - Ess-zett or scharfes S
No word starts with ẞ. It is acceptable to replace ẞ with ss if the keyboard doesn't support ẞ letter. This letter is not used in schweizerdeutsch ( German spoken in Switzerland).
German Keyboard and position of umlauts and Special letter in a German Keyboard:
If you are working with International Keyboard / English keyboard and want to type these special character and umlaut letters in German language with English keyboard,
Please follow the section below.
Typing Special characters in English keyboard in Windows OS :
For users using International Keyboard and wants to type the German Umalute or esszet character.
Following steps needs to be done
1- Switch on the Numlock
2- hold the alt key
3- press the corresponding number with alt key already pressed.
Following numbers indicate the following umlaute and special character
ä - 0228 Ä - 0196
ö - 0246 Ö - 0214
ü - 0252 Ü - 0220
ß - 0223
NOTE : -
This method of getting umlauts and special character is applicable for Windows operating system.
For MAC OS :
1- Press and hold press the following keys ,The option/alt key and letter u and then release it, After that
2- Press a, o or u whose umlaut you want to have
