This is an overview of the pronunciaton rules for Norwegian vowels. You will find both sound files and videos to help you further.
Table of Contents
- 9 vowels, long and short
- u y i
- More about the vowels e, o and u
- Diphthongs (gliding vowels)
- Vowels in words and expressions
9 vowels, long and short
Norwegian has 9 vowels. You can listen to them here.
A E I O U Y Æ Ø Å
The vowels can be long and short. In this video, you can see the long and the short version demonstrated.
The double consonant indicates that the vowel standing in front of it is short. In most cases, you also get a short vowel before two different consonants.
This table may help you understand it better.
A mat (food) – matt (faint, dim)
E sen (late) – sende (send)
I pine (pain) – pinne (stick)
O los (ship pilot) – ost (cheese)
U ruge (brood) – lugge (pull by the hair)
Y hyle (scream) – hylle (shelf)
Æ være (to be) – færre (fewer)
Ø søke (search) – løkke (loop)
Å måte (way of) – måtte (had to)
However, there are also some commonly used words with a short vowel before just one vowel, like these ones:
hun, han, men, hos, nok, til
In inflected forms (the form that you do not find in the dictionary), the vowel usually remains long. Fint is an inflected form of fin, both with a long vowel. Sint (angry) with a short vowel is not an inflected form.
fin, fint, sint
u y i
The y lies somewhere in between the u and the i. Listen to these words with u and y to hear the difference:
lus (louse) lys (light) lutt (lute) lytt (noisy)
This video may also help you:
And listen two these words for the difference between y and i:
sy (sow) si (say) skylle (rinse) skille (divide)
You can also check out this video
More about the vowels e, o and u
These three vowels are often pronounced in a different way than explained above. You will find more details below.
E
E is often pronounced like a Norwegian æ before an r. In one word – de – e sounds like a Norwegian i.
short æ-sound Bergen voice
herre, lerke, ert
e+rl/rn Trondheim
linerle, perle, jern
e+rl/rn Bergen
linerle, perle, jern
long æ-sound in these words
er, her, der, hver
e sounds like i
Pronoun “de”
O
O is usually pronounced with Norwegian o-sound (the sound of the letter o) as a long vowel. As a short vowel, it is usually pronounced with å-sound. You also hear the å-sound before the v, and in the words tog, og, også.
long o-sound
sol, mote, ro
short å-sound
flott, sopp, vogn, fold
long å-sound
tog, sove, lov
å-sound
og, også
Be aware that there are many exceptions to the pattern of the o, and we do not explain every single case here. However, this video could be useful:
U
U is pronounced with Norwegian u-sound (sound of the letter u) when it is a long vowel. As a short vowel, it is pronounced with Norwegian o-sound before ng, kk and a few combinations with k.
long u-sound
sur lur kul hus
u + nk/ng/kk/ks/ kn/kt
bukse, lunken, ung
short u-sound
buss, full, kutte
This video can also be helpful when it comes to the u sound and the o-sound.
Diphthongs (gliding vowels)
The diphthongs are usually indicated by writing two vowels after each other.
ei, ai, au, øy, oi
leie, kai, haug, løype, joik
Ei, ai, au and øy are also demonstrated in this video (oi is less common).
Vowels in words and expressions
To make it sound more natural, I have made a video where I demonstrate long and short vowels in different words and expressions.
Do you have any questions? have also written an article for you about Norwegian pronunciation in general. It has more focus on the consonants. In addition, there is an article with a lot of extra pronunciation videos, most of them are about the vowels. You will find all this on the customer pages, and the password is always the same.
