The R

hace 5 años

One of the hardest sounds in Spanish pronunciation for foreingners speakers is the letter R. The difficulty of this letter is that sometimes it has a soft sound (like in “sonrisa” or “sorpresa”) and sometimes it has a strong sound (like in “ratón” or “remera”). And, as if this wasn’t confusing enough, then comes our lovely friend... the RR (with a very strong sound like in “arriba” or “perro”).

So, to make it easier, here are all the R rules for you:

Rules of Words that are written with R

Nº. 1:  At the end of a word. In these cases it has a soft sound (saber, morir, confiar, relatar)

Nº. 2:  In the middle of a word, with soft sound (sarten, mirada, perdida)

Nº. 3: After the consonants B, C, D, F, G, P and T with soft sound (brillo, criado, dromedario, frágil).

Nº. 4: At the beginning of the word. In these cases it has a strong sound (rama, remedio, ritual).

Nº. 5:  After the consonants L, N and S , it has a strong sound (alrededor, honradez or israelita).

Nº. 6: After the prefix sub, also has a strong sound (subrayado or subrogación).

Rules of Words that are written with RR

Nº. 1: The letter RR is written in the strong sounds that go between vowels (arroyo, arriba, barreño, carrera, desarrollo or parrilla).

Nº. 2: The negation prefix in becomes ir when it goes in front of r (irreal or irrealizable).

Nº. 3: In compound words whose first element ends in vowel and the second begins with r (pelirrojo or pararrayos). 

Excepciones:
when the two terms of the compound are separated by a hyphen as in greco-romano.