If you can read this page, you are ninety percent of the way to reading Uzbek. The official alphabet is Latin, every letter has one sound, and only five letters need a little explanation. This post is the whole alphabet, in order, with the closest English sound and an Uzbek example for each.
Latin or Cyrillic: which one to learn
Learn Latin. Uzbekistan adopted a Latin alphabet in the 1990s, made it mandatory in state institutions from 1 January 2023, and the presidential administration switched fully in 2025. Documents, ID cards, road signs, official websites and public advertising use Latin. Cyrillic survives on older signs, in some newspapers and among older speakers. You will want to recognise it. You will not need to write it. Uzbekcha teaches Latin only and shows Cyrillic where you’re likely to meet it.
(A reform replacing the apostrophe letters with diacritics has been discussed for years. As of this writing the 1995 alphabet below is the one in official use.)
The 29 letters
| Letter | Sounds like | Example |
|---|---|---|
| A a | “a” in father, shorter | ana (mother), olma (apple) |
| B b | “b” in bed | bir (one), bozor (bazaar) |
| D d | “d” in dog | dost (friend), dars (lesson) |
| E e | “e” in bed | el (people), besh (five) |
| F f | “f” in fun | futbol, fikr (thought) |
| G g | hard “g” in go | gul (flower), gap (word, talk) |
| H h | “h” in hat, soft | hovli (courtyard), hech (none) |
| I i | “i” in machine, shorter | ikki (two), ish (work) |
| J j | “j” in jam (in Russian loans, “s” in measure: jurnal) | joy (place), juda (very) |
| K k | “k” in kite | kitob (book), kun (day) |
| L l | “l” in light | lola (tulip), til (language) |
| M m | “m” in man | men (I), maktab (school) |
| N n | “n” in no | non (bread), nima (what) |
| O o | “o” in British hot or law, open | osh (plov), ot (horse) |
| P p | “p” in pen | pul (money), paxta (cotton) |
| Q q | “k” made at the back of the throat | qiz (girl), qancha (how much) |
| R r | rolled “r”, as in Spanish | rahmat (thanks), rang (colour) |
| S s | “s” in sun | suv (water), sen (you, informal) |
| T t | “t” in top | tosh (stone), tun (night) |
| U u | “u” in put | uy (house), uch (three) |
| V v | “v” in van, often close to “w” | vaqt (time), va (and) |
| X x | “ch” in Scottish loch, German Bach | xayr (goodbye), xona (room) |
| Y y | “y” in yes | yoʻl (road), yaxshi (good) |
| Z z | “z” in zoo | zar (gold), zamon (era) |
| Oʻ oʻ | “o” in go without the glide; rounded, closed | oʻzbek, oʻn (ten), koʻz (eye) |
| Gʻ gʻ | French “r” in Paris; a gargled g | gʻalaba (victory), bogʻ (garden), togʻ (mountain) |
| Sh sh | “sh” in ship | shahar (city), shirin (sweet) |
| Ch ch | “ch” in chip | choy (tea), chiroyli (beautiful) |
| Ng ng | “ng” in sing (never “n-g”) | ming (thousand), tong (dawn) |
That is the whole alphabet. There is no c on its own and no w; foreign names keep their spelling.
The five letters to practise
Q and K are different letters and different sounds. K is the English one. Q is made further back, against the soft palate, like the “c” in “caught” pushed down your throat. Qiz (girl) and kiz are not the same word.
X is not “ks”. It is the fricative in “loch” and “Bach”. Xayr (goodbye) begins with a breathy throat sound, not with “z” or “ks”. Russian speakers: it is your х.
Gʻ is the voiced twin of x, the sound of a Parisian “r”. Say x and add voice. Togʻ (mountain), bogʻ (garden), gʻalaba (victory).
O and Oʻ. The single most common beginner mistake is treating these as the same letter. Plain o is open, like “law”. Oʻ is closed and rounded, like “go” or the vowel in German “schön” for some speakers. The language is oʻzbek, not ozbek. Ot is horse; oʻt is fire or grass.
Ng is one sound, the end of “sing”, and it never breaks into “n” + “g”. Ming (thousand) rhymes with English “ring”.
The apostrophe that isn’t a letter: tutuq belgisi
You will see an apostrophe inside words that has nothing to do with oʻ and gʻ: sanʼat (art), maʼno (meaning), aʼlo (excellent). That is the tutuq belgisi, a sign (not a letter) that marks either a slight pause or a lengthening of the vowel before it, usually in words borrowed from Arabic. Officially it should be the right single quotation mark (ʼ), while oʻ and gʻ use the modifier letter turned comma (ʻ). In everyday typing both come out as a straight apostrophe, and everyone copes.
Stress and rhythm
Stress falls on the last syllable of a word in nearly every case: rah-MAT, ki-TOB, oʻz-bek-CHA. Suffixes take the stress with them: kitob → kitob-LAR → kitoblar-IM. The exceptions are a handful of suffixes (the question -mi, the negative -ma) and some loanwords, which Uzbekcha marks for you.
Reading your first sentence
Men oʻzbekcha oʻrganyapman. “I am learning Uzbek.”
- men = I
- oʻzbekcha = Uzbek (the language); note both oʻs are the closed vowel
- oʻrganyapman = oʻrgan (learn) + -yap (right now) + -man (I)
Say it: men oʻz-bek-CHA oʻr-gan-yap-MAN. That is the sentence Uzbekcha’s first lesson starts from, in your language, with a native voice. Join the waitlist, or start with the free phrasebook.