Bulgarian, like a few other Slavic languages, uses the Cyrillic alphabet. There are some slight variations of this alphabet depending on the country. For example, Russian Cyrillic has a few different letters from the Bulgarian one and some letters that are identical but pronounced slightly differently.
Bulgarian Cyrillic alphabet
Between brackets are the cursive forms of the characters, when different from the script form.
Don't worry about memorizing all of the letters now, we'll work through them in the exercises.
| Cyrillic | Romanization | Pronunciation | |
|---|---|---|---|
| А а (а) | a | a as in "bath" | |
| Б б | b | b as in "bug" | |
| В в (в) | v | v as in "vet" | |
| Г г (г) | g | g as in "good" | |
Д д (д,  ) |
d | d as in "dog" | |
| Е е | e | e as in "best" | |
| Ж ж | zh | s as in "treasure" | |
| З з | z | z as in "zoo" | |
| И и (и) | i | i as in "machine" | |
| Й й (й) | y | y as in "yes" or "way" | |
| К к | k | k as in "make" | |
| Л л (л) | l | l as in "call" or "lend" | |
| М м | m | m as in "man" | |
| Н н | n | n as in "normal" | |
| О о | o | o as in "order" | |
| П п (п) | p | p as in "pet" | |
| Р р | r | trilled r as in Spanish "perro" | |
| С с | s | s as in "sound" | |
| Т т (т) | t | t as in "top" | |
| У у | u | oo as in "tool" | |
| Ф ф | f | f as in "food" | |
| Х х | h | ch as in Scottish "loch" | |
| Ц ц (ц) | ts | ts as in "fits" | |
| Ч ч | ch | ch as in "chip" | |
| Ш ш (ш) | sh | sh as in "shot" | |
| Щ щ (щ) | sht | sht as in "shtick" | |
| Ъ ъ | u or a | u as in "turn" | |
| Ь ь | y | y as in "canyon" | (1) |
| Ю ю | yu | yu as in "youth" | |
| Я я | ya | ya as in "kayak" |
Source: Bulgarian Cyrillic, by the Wikipedia community, licensed under CC BY-SA. This version includes modifications.
Notes
(1) the ь letter (soft sign) cannot be pronounced by itself, it has the effect of softening the previous consonant.
Pronunciation tips
In Bulgarian, all letters are pronounced (no silent letters).
Most words have a tonic accent (stress), which will influence the way some vowels are pronounced:
- The о will be pronounced like the "o" in "order" when stressed, and like the "o" in "bored" (but more closed and shorter) when not.
- The а will be pronounced like the "a" in "bath" when stressed, and like the "u" in "nut" when not.
- The у will be pronounced like the "oo" in "tool" (but shorter) when stressed, and like the "o" in "bored" (but more closed and shorter) when not.
- The ъ will be pronounced like the "u" in "turn" (but more closed) when stressed, and like the "u" in "nut" when not.
As ю and я, contain the sounds of the letters а and у, they change the same way when stressed or unstressed.
At the end of a word, and before a voiceless consonant, the following voiced consonants turn into their voiceless counterparts: б, в, г, д, ж, з are pronounced respectively as п, ф, к, т, ш, с. You are maybe already familiar with this fact, as Slavic last names such as « Borisov » are pronounced « Borisof ».