Somali phonology

This article describes the phonology of the Somali language.

Consonants

Common Somali has 23 consonant phonemes. Its consonants cover every place of articulation on the IPA chart, though not all of these distinctions are phonemic.

Somali consonant phonemes

		Labial	Dental/Alveolar	Postalveolar	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Pharyngeal	Glottal
Nasal		m	n
Stop	voiceless		t			k	q		ʔ
	voiced	b	d	ɖ		ɡ
Affricate	voiceless			tʃ
	voiced			dʒ
Fricative	voiceless	f	s	ʃ		x		ħ	h
	voiced							ʕ
Approximant			l		j	w
Trill			r

Vowels

Somali monophthongs

	Front series		Back series
	short	long	short	long
Close front unrounded / Near-close near-front unrounded	i	iː	ɪ	ɪː
Close-mid front unrounded / Open-mid front unrounded	e	eː	ɛ	ɛː
Near-open front unrounded / Open back unrounded	æ	æː	ɑ	ɑː
Open-mid central rounded / Open-mid back rounded	ɞ	ɞː	ɔ	ɔː
Close central rounded / Close back rounded	ʉ	ʉː	u	uː

Somali diphthongs

First element is front		First element is back
short	long	short	long
æi	æːi	ɑɪ	ɑːɪ
æʉ	æːʉ	ɑu	ɑːu
ei	ɞːi	ɛɪ	ɛːɪ
ɵi	ɞːi	ɔɪ	ɔːɪ
ɞʉ	ɞːʉ	ɔu	ɔːu

External links

• Somali phonology