Maldivian phonology

The phonemic inventory of Maldivian consists of 29 consonants and 10 vowels. Like other modern Indo-Aryan languages the Maldivian phonemic inventory shows an opposition of long and short vowels, of dental and retroflex consonants as well as single and geminate consonants.

Vowels

	Front				Central		Back
	Unrounded		Rounded				Unrounded		Rounded
	short	long	short	long	short	long	short	long	short	long
Close	i	iː	y	yː	ɨ	ɨː	ɯ	ɯː	u	uː
Mid	e	eː	ø	øː	ə	əː	ɤ	ɤː	o	oː
Open	ɛ	ɛː	œ	œː	a	aː	ɑ	ɑː	ɔ	ɔː

Consonants

	Labial		Dental		Alveolar		Retroflex		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Nasal		m				n		ɳ		ɲ		ŋ
Stop		b ᵐb	t	d ⁿd			ʈ	ɖ ᶯɖ	c	ɟ	k	ɡ ᵑɡ
Fricative	f	v	θ	z	s		ʂ		ɕ		x	ɣ	h
Approximant		ʋ		l̪		l		ɭ		j		ɰ
Trill		ʙ				r

External links

• Maldivian phonology