The Croatian language – simplified!

Just like any new language, when encountering Croatian for the first time, it can seem intimidating. Firstly, there seems to be an array of familiar letters that have combined with lines and strange little upside-down roofs. Secondly, when spoken it can sound quite aggressive. Thirdly, as it is a Slavic language, it has that reputation of being difficult, like Russian or Polish.

Well, we have good news for you if English is your mother-tongue or if you speak English as an additional language: Croatian is the easiest of all the Slavic languages to learn for English speakers!

PRONUNCIATION
The Croatian alphabet has 30 letters and doesn’t use the letters x, y, w or q. The letters that are in the English alphabet are pronounced in a similar, but “pure” way and, importantly, always with the same short sounds.

For example, the letter “c” in English can be an “s” sound, like “ceiling” or a hard “k” sound, as in cat.
In contrast, the “c” in Croatian is pronounced “ts”. So “car” would be pronounced “tsar”.
Another important one is “j”, which is pronounced “y”, as in “yellow”.
The vowels are “pure”, which means they are short and simple: “i” as “into”, not “irony”.

For the ‘’unusual’’ letters, they are pronounced as follows:
č = “ch” as in chuckle
ć = a soft version of “ch”, like the “t” in future
đ = like the “g” in age
š = “sh” as in sheep
ž = like the “s” in pleasure
h = like the Scottish “ch” in loch

And that’s it – not that difficult so far….?