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Tricky consonants

The Icelandic language has some tricky consonants that can cause learners some trouble. These all have more than one pronunciation depending on the context. Choose a consonant below to get an explanation:

fghkp

Tricky consonants​

f​

The letter f can have quite a few different pronunciations in Icelandic depending on the context.

f[f] at the start of a word or when written <ff>:
    fela, gaffall

[v] between vowels, before ð/g/r or at the end of a word:
    lofa, sofa, grafa, hafði, hafrar, raf

[p] before l/n:
    Keflavík, efni

[m] before nd:
    hefnd, nefnd

[m̥] (devoiced “m”) before nt:
    nefnt

[  ] (dropped altogether) between á/ó/ú and vowel:
    lófi, húfa

Tongue-twister

Try your f’s out with this tongue-twister: 👅 Í fallegu stofunni var stefnt á hefnd.

g​

The letter g can be quite troublesome. The pronunciation varies a lot depending on the context and sometimes it’s not pronounced at all!

g[k] at start of word or between vowel and l/n:
    glápa, gala, hagl, logn

[c] (palatised “k”) at start of word before e, i/y, í/ý, ei/ey, æ or when written gj:
    gera, giftur, geispa, gæs, gjafir, gjörðu

[ɣ] after vowel and before a/u/ð/r or at end of word:
    fluga, vegur, lægð, sigra, lag

[x] (the same sound as Scots “loch”) after vowel and before t/s:
    dragt, lags

[j] between vowel and i/j:
    lygi, fægiskófla, segja

[  ] (dropped altogether) between á/ó/ú and a/u:
    plága, plógur, fljúga

Tongue-twister

Get your g game on with this tongue-twister: 👅 Glaða flugan flýgur hægt og óþægilega.

h​

The letter h isn’t always pronounced as a separate sound. Often, it’s used to indicate a different pronunciation of the consonant that follows it.

h[k] when written <hv>:
    hvað, hvalur, Hveragerði

[ç] when written <hj>:
    hjarta, hjálpa, hjón, Hjörtur

[  ] (dropped altogether) before devoiced consonants, i.e. <hl, hn, hr>:
    hlynur, hnerra, hræðilegur

[h] everywhere else:
    haka, herja, hóll

k​

Like in English, the k sound varies depending on what comes after it.

k[k] between vowels or at the end of a word:
    raka, leikur, eik, lok

[kʰ] (aspirated “k”, see above) at the start of a word:
    kafa, kaupa, köttur

[cʰ] at the start of a word before e, i/y, í/ý, æ, ei/ey or when written kj:
    keppni, keyra, kæra, kjaftur

[x] before t/s or in <x>
    lykt, október, bakstur, lax

p​

There are a few variants of how the letter p is pronounced in Icelandic.

p[p] between vowels or at the end of a word:
    api, glápa, krap, ösp

[pʰ] (aspirated “p”, see above) at the start of a word:
    pabbi, plógur, poki

[f] before t/s:
    skipta, skipstjóri

Other consonants​

Most of the other consonants in Icelandic are relatively straightforward, but it’s worth just pointing a few things out about some of them:

  • In Icelandic, s is never voiced. This means it’s never pronounced /z/, even in between vowels. The Icelandic s is quite sharp and whistly (IPA: [s̺]), similar to the s sound in Spain;
  • The Icelandic v sound is not a pure /v/ like in English, sitting somewhere between the /v/ and /w/ sounds of English (IPA: [ʋ]). This is why Icelanders sometimes mix these two sounds up when speaking English, and say things like “this is a wery nice willage”.