Silent letters in French - When to pronounce a final letter?
Silent letters in French
Silent letters in French are often seen as a difficulty.
Discover all the rules and many examples to determine whether a letter is silent or not.

Table of content
- Are final vowels silent in French?
- Which final consonants should you pronounce?
- Final consonants are usually silent letters in french
- Focus on the consonants c and x
Are final vowels silent in French?
First, let’s make a distinction between the vowels and the consonants. On one hand, final vowels are always pronounced, except for the letter e.
1. At the end of a word, A, I, O and Y are never silent letters in French
The first rule is easy: the vowels a, i,
o and y are always pronounced at the end of a word.
For example:
2. E is usually silent at the end of a word
When it comes at the end of a word, the vowel e is usually a silent letter in French. For example:
3. However, E is a silent letter in this case...
The vowel e is pronounced, only when it comes at the end of a monosyllabic word, after a consonant:
Which final consonants should you pronounce?
We’ve just seen that final vowels were relatively easy. But when it comes to final consonants, things get a little more
complicated!
Here are all the rules to recognize the silent consonants in French...
Loanwords and onomatopoeias are not silent letters in French
Loanwords are words which come from another language. In French, they mainly come from English.
In such words, there is usually no silent letter:

Some letters, such as j, k, v or w never come at the end of a French word.
Therefore, when you spot a “French” word ending in one of these letters, it is necessarily a loanword.
As a consequence, the final consonant will not be a silent letter.
The same applies to the letter b, except in the two words plomb (lead, metal) and aplomb (composure), where the final b is silent.
Combined letters are pronounced at the end of a word
In the section about combined letters in French, you'll discover how to pronounce them.And when such combinations are placed at the end of a word, the final consonant will combine to the letter(s) before, as usual.
Here are some examples:
Latin words ending in en and um are the only exception. In such words, the pronunciation is the same as in English:
F, L, Q and R are pronounced at the end of a word.
Consonants f, l, q and
r are pronounced at the end of a French word.
For example:
Final consonants are usually silent letters in french
Plural Forms
The plural forms of nouns and adjectives are marked with silent letters in French: either s
or x.
For example:
The final s will not be pronounced, but it will change the sound of the vowel e before.
This is due to the rules governing the pronunciation of the vowel e (French E – Learn how to pronounce it).
For example:
Verb conjugations
Let’s have a look at a few forms of the verb parler (to speak / to talk) in the present tense. The three following forms are pronounced the same:
D, G, P, S, T and Z are usually silent
At the end of a word, the letters d, g,
p, s, t and
z are usually silent letters in French.
Here are some examples:
Apart from loanwords (see above), there are very few exceptions to this rule. Here are some of them:
Focus on the consonants c and x
Regarding the consonants c and x, here are the rules you should apply to be right 9 times out of ten:
Consonant C
At the end of a word, the French c is usually pronounced as a
k, except in words ending in anc and
onc, where it is silent.
For example:
Consonant X
x is a silent letter in French:
- when it is used as a plural mark.
- in words ending in ix and ux.
Two major exceptions
The numbers six (six) and dix (ten) are exceptions: the final x is pronounced as an s:
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