Below is a table of the Hebrew letters and vowels (nikudot) along with their names and how to pronounce them in modern Hebrew.
Background:
The Hebrew language has existed for thousands of years. It is a fairly logical and well-structured language with relatively few exceptions, and has remained so despite its age. However, as the Jews who used it moved from country to country during their long exile from the Land of Israel many variations in pronunciation came into being.
The various pronunciations are still used by many during religious functions such as prayer or reading from the Torah, Talmud and other sacred works. However, the overwhelming majority of people that speak Hebrew today use the "Modern" Hebrew pronunciation used in Israel, so for simplicity we have chosen that pronunciation for this site.
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Throughout our site we present transliterations (pronunciations written using Latin letters) using the following conventions:
- All letters and vowels are represented by the Modern Hebrew pronunciations as described in the table below.
- Syllables in multi-syllable words are separated by hyphens
- The syllable said with most emphasis in each word will be written with all capital letters.
- If a word has only one syllable it will be written with all capital letters.
- In some cases we have listed the correct pronunciations for words even though they are pronounced slighty differently in common speech.
Click here for a printable version of the chart.
Or click here to print separate tables with the Hebrew letters and the Hebrew vowels.
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