For assistance in making phonetic transcriptions of Russian for Wikipedia articles, see This article discusses the phonological system of standard Russian based on the Moscow dialect (unless otherwise noted). For discussion of other dialects, see Russian dialects. Russian possesses five vowels and consonants typically come in pairs of hard (твёрдый [ˈtvʲo.rdɨj]) and soft (мягкий [ˈmʲæ.xʲkʲɪj]) or plain and palatalized.

Vowels

Russian possesses five vowel phonemes which are subject to considerable allophony. A number of linguists consider [ɨ] to be a separate phoneme; the interpretation taken by this article is that it is an allophone of /i/:

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i	(ɨ)	u
Mid	e	(ə)	o
Open		a

Vowel allophony is largely dependent on stress and the palatalization of neighboring consonants:

Front vowels

When a preceding consonant is hard, /i/ is retracted to [ɨ]. While this is phonetically central, for phonological purposes it is considered back. When unstressed, /i/ becomes near-close; that is, [ɨ̞] following a hard consonant and [ɪ] in most other environments. Between soft consonants, both stressed and unstressed /i/ are raised, as in пить [pʲi̝tʲ] ('to drink') and маленький [ˈmalʲɪ̝nʲkʲɪj] ('small'). When preceded and followed by coronal or dorsal consonants, [ɨ] is fronted to [ɨ̟]. After a labial + /l/ cluster, [ɨ] is retracted, as in плыть [plɨ̠tʲ] ('to float'); it is also slightly diphthongized to [ɯ̟ɨ̟].

In native words, /e/ only follows unpaired (i.e. the retroflexes and /t͡s/) and palatalized consonants. After palatalized consonants (but not before), it is a mid vowel ([e̞] or [ɛ̝]), while a following palatalized consonant raises it to [e]. Another allophone, an open-mid [ɛ] occurs word-initially and never before or after palatalized consonants (hereafter [ɛ̝] is represented without the diacritic for simplicity). Preceding hard consonants retract /e/ to [ɛ̠] and [e̠] so that жест ('gesture') and цель ('target') are pronounced [ʐɛ̠st] and respectively.

In words borrowed from other languages, it is often the case that /e/ does not follow a palatalized consonant until the word has been fully adopted into Russian. For instance, шофёр (from French chauffeur) was pronounced [ʂoˈfɛr] in the early twentieth century but is now pronounced [ʂɐˈfʲor]. On the other hand, the pronunciations of words such as отель [ɐˈtɛlʲ] ('hotel') retain the hard consonants despite a long presence in the language.

Back vowels

Between soft consonants, /a/ becomes [æ] as in пять [pʲætʲ] ('five'). When not following a palatalized consonant, /a/ is retracted to [ɑ̟] before /l/ as in палка [ˈpɑ̟lkə] ('stick').

For most speakers, /o/ is a mid vowel but it can be more open for some speakers. Between palatalized consonants or simply following a one, /o/ is centralized to [ɵ̞] as in тётя [ˈtʲɵ.tʲə] ('aunt').

As with the other back vowels, /u/ is centralized between palatalized consonants, as in чуть [t͡ɕʉtʲ] ('narrowly'). When unstressed, /u/ becomes near-close.

Vowel reduction

Unstressed vowels tend to merge together. /o/ and /a/ generally have the same unstressed allophones and unstressed /e/ becomes /i/ (picking up its unstressed allophones). Russian orthography (as opposed to that of linguistically similar Belarusian) does not reflect vowel reduction.

The realization of unstressed /o/ and /a/ goes as follows:

• After hard consonants, both reduce to [ə] or [ɐ]; [ɐ] appears in the syllable immediately before the stress and in and absolute word-initial position. Examples: паром [pɐˈrom] ('ferry'), облако [ˈobləkə] ('cloud'), трава [trɐˈva] ('grass').
• When <аа>, <ао>, <оа>, or <оо> is written in a word, it indicates [ɐ.ɐ] so that соображать ('to use common sense/to reason'), is pronounced [sɐ.ɐ.brɐˈʐatʲ].
• Both /o/ and /a/ merge with /i/ after palatalized consonants and /j/ (/o/ is written as <е> in these positions). This occurs for /o/ after retroflex consonants as well. Examples: жена [ʐɨ̞ˈna] ('wife'), язык [jɪˈzɨk] ('tongue').
• These processes occur even across word boundaries as in под морем [pɐˈd‿morʲɪm] ('under the sea').

Across certain word-final suffixes, the reductions do not completely apply. In certain suffixes, after palatalized consonants and /j/, /a/ and /o/ (which is written as <е>) can be distinguished from /i/ and from each other: по́ле ('field' nom. sg. neut,)' is different from по́ля ('field' sg.gen), and these final sounds differ from the realization of /i/ in such position.

There are a number of exceptions to the above comments on unstressed /о/ and /a/.

• Firstly, /o/ is not always reduced in foreign borrowings, eg радио, [ˈra.dʲɪ.o] ('radio').
• Secondly, some speakers pronounce /a/ as [ɨ] after retroflex consonants (/ʐ/ and /ʂ/. This pronunciation generally only applies to жалеть [ʐɨˈlʲetʲ] ('to regret'), к сожалению [ksə.ʐɨˈlʲe.nʲɪ.ju] ('unfortunately'), and oblique cases of лошадь ('horse'), such as лошадей, [lə.ʂɨˈdʲej].
• Thirdly, /i/ replaces /a/ after /t͡s/ in the oblique cases of some numerals, eg. двадцати, [dvə.t͡sɨˈtʲi] ('twenty').

In addition to this, the unstressed high vowels /i/ and /u/ become lax (or near-close) as in ютиться [jʉ̞ˈtʲit͡sə] ('to huddle'), этап [ɪˈtap] ('stage'), дышать [dɨ̞ˈʂatʲ] ('to breathe'), and мужчина [mʊˈɕɕinə] ('man').

In weakly stressed positions, vowels may become voiceless between two voiceless consonants: выставка [ˈvɨstə̥fkə] ('exhibition'), потому что ('because'). This may also happen in cases where only the following consonant is voiceless: череп [t͡ɕerʲɪ̥p] ('skull').

Diphthongs

Russian diphthongs all end in a non-syllabic [i̯], which can be considered an allophone of /j/, the only semivowel in Russian. In all contexts other than after a vowel, /j/ is considered an approximant consonant. Phonological descriptions of /j/ may also classify it as a consonant even in the coda. In such descriptions, Russian has no diphthongs.

The first part of diphthongs are subject to the same allophony as their constituent vowels. Examples of words with diphthongs: яйцо [jɪjˈt͡so] ('egg'), ей [jej] ('her' instr), действенный [ˈdʲejstvʲɛnnɨj] ('effective'). /ij/ (written <ий> or <ый>) is a common adjectival affix where it is often unstressed; at normal conversational speed, such unstressed endings may be monophthongized to [ɪ̟].

Consonants

<ʲ> denotes palatalization, meaning the center of the tongue is raised during and after the articulation of the consonant.

		Bilabial	Labio- dental	Dental & Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Nasal	hard	/m/		/n/
	soft	/mʲ/		/nʲ/
Plosive	hard	/p/   /b/		/t/   /d/			/k/   /g/
	soft	/pʲ/   /bʲ/		/tʲ/   /dʲ/			/kʲ/   [gʲ]
Affricate	hard			/t͡s/
	soft				/t͡ɕ/
Fricative	hard		/f/   /v/	/s/   /z/	/ʂ/   /ʐ/		/x/
	soft		/fʲ/   /vʲ/	/sʲ/   /zʲ/	/ɕɕ/   /ʑʑ/		[xʲ]
Trill	hard			/r/
	soft			/rʲ/
Approximant	hard			/l/
	soft			/lʲ/		/j/

Phonetic details:

• Almost all consonants come in hard/soft pairs. Exceptions are consonants that are always hard /t͡s/, /ʂ/, and /ʐ/; and consonants that are always soft /t͡ɕ/, /ɕɕ/, /ʑʑ/, and /j/.
• The soft/hard distinction for velar consonants is typically allophonic; /kʲ/ might be considered a marginal phoneme, although its occurrence before non-front vowels is mostly in words of foreign origin.
• /ʐ/ is similar to the in genre, but the tongue is curled back (as with the /r/ of American English) rather than domed. /ʂ/ differs from this only by being voiceless. For more, see retroflex consonant.
• /ɕɕ/ and /ʑʑ/ are also marginal phonemes. A formerly common pronunciation of /ɕt͡ɕ/ indicates the sound may be two underlying phonemes: |ʂt͡ɕ|. The status of /ʑʑ/ as a phoneme is also marginal since it may derive from an underlying |zʐ| or |sʐ| and its use is becoming more archaic compared to a geminated hard [ʐʐ] (although the former continues to be standard in media and government). For more information, see Alveolo-palatal consonant.
• Plain and palatalized /rʲ/ are both dental and apical while palatalized and /lʲ/ are alveolar and laminal . Note that, for /tʲ/ and /dʲ/, the tongue is raised enough to produce slight frication. Plain /l/ is typically pharyngealized ("dark" [ɫ]).
• /s/ and /z/ are laminal and dental (or dento-alveolar) while /t͡s/ is alveolar and apical.
• Plain /r/ is postalveolar: [r̠].

A series of reductionist approaches made by many structuralists have postulated an underlying deep structure wherein palatalized consonants are the result of phonological processes. Despite such proposals, linguists have long agreed that the underlying structure of Russian is closer to that of its acoustic properties, namely that palatalized consonants are phonemes in their own right.

Phonological processes

Voiced consonants (and /ʑʑ/) are devoiced word-finally unless the next word begins with a voiced obstruent. /g/, in addition becoming voiceless, also lenites to [x].

Russian features a general retrograde assimilation of voicing and palatalization. In longer clusters, this means that multiple consonants may be palatalized despite their underlyingly (and orthographically) being unpalatalized. The process of voicing assimilation applies across word-boundaries when there's no pause between words.

Voicing

Within a morpheme, voicing is not distinctive before obstruents (except for /v/, and /vʲ/ when followed by a vowel or sonorant). The voicing or devoicing is determined by that of the final obstruent in the sequence: просьба ('request'), водка ('vodka'). In foreign borrowings, this isn't always the case for /f(ʲ)/, as in Адольф Гитлер ('Adolf Hitler') and граф болеет ('the count is ill'). /v/ and /vʲ/ are unusual in that they seem transparent to voicing assimilation; in the syllable onset, both voiced and voiceless consonants may appear before /v(ʲ)/:

• тварь ('the creature')
• два ('two')
• световой ('luminous')
• звезда ('star')

When /v(ʲ)/ precedes and follows obstruents, the voicing of the cluster is goverened by that of the final segment (per the rule above) so that voiceless obstruents that precede /v(ʲ)/ are voiced if /v(ʲ)/ is followed by a voiced obstruent (e.g. к вдове 'to the widow') while a voiceless obstruent will devoice all segments (e.g. без впуска 'without an admission').

/t͡ɕ/, /t͡s/, and /x/ have voiced allophones before voiced obstruents, as in дочь бы ('a daughter would' [I like to have]) and плацдарм [plɐd͡zˈdarm] ('bridge-head').

Other than /mʲ/ and /nʲ/, nasals and liquids devoice between voiceless consonants or a voiceless consonant and a pause: контрфорс [ˌkontr̥ˈfors] ('buttress').

Palatalization

Before /j/, paired consonants are normally palatalized as in пью [pʲju] ('I drink') and пьеса [ˈpʲjɛ.sə] ('theatrical play'). съездить [ˈsje.zʲdʲɪtʲ] ('to go/ travel') is an exception to this for many speakers. Paired consonants preceding /e/ are also palatalized; although there are exceptions from loanwords, alternations across morpheme boundaries are the norm. The Following examples show the different types of alternations:

• дом ('house' nominative) vs. доме ('house' prepositional)
• ржавый ('rusty') vs. ржаветь ('to rust')
• ответ ('answer') vs. ответить ('to answer')
• несу ('I carry') vs. несёт ('carries')
• голод ('hunger') vs. голоден ('hungry' masc.)
• удал ('daring') vs. удалец ('daring man')
• жена ('wife') vs. женин ('wife's')
• корова ('cow') vs. коровий ('bovine')
• кругл ('round') vs. кругленький ('roundish')
• широк ('wide') vs. ширина ('width')
• прям ('straight') vs. прямизна ('straightness')
• умыкан ('abducted') vs. умыкание ('abduction')
• вор ('thief') vs. воришка ('thief' pejorative)
• написал ('he wrote') vs. написали ('they wrote')
• горбун ('hunchback') vs. горбунья ('female hunchback')
• ангел ('angel') vs. ангельский ('angelic')
• высь ('height') vs. высок ('high')

Because velar consonants are unpaired, palatalization contrasts do not exist, especially before front vowels. Allophonically, they become palatalized as in короткий [kɐˈrotkʲɪj] ('short') unless there is a word boundary, in which case they are plain (e.g. к Ивану 'to Ivan').

Before plain dental consonants, /r/, /rʲ/, labial and dental consonants are plain: орла [ɐrˈla] ('eagle' gen. sg).

Before palatalized labial and dental consonants or /lʲ/, dental consonants (other than /t͡s/) are palatalized.

Velar consonants are palatalized when preceding /i/; within words, this means that velar consonants are never followed by [ɨ].

/x/ assimilates the palatalization of the following velar consonant легких [ˈlʲɵxʲkʲɪx] ('lungs' gen. pl).

Palatalization assimilation of labial consonants before labial consonants is in free variation with nonassimilation, that is бомбить ('to bomb') is either [bɐmˈbʲitʲ] or [bɐmʲˈbʲitʲ] depending on the individual speaker.

When plain /n/ precedes its palatalized cognate, it is also palatalized (see gemination). This is slightly less common across affix boundaries.

In addition to this, dental stridents conform to the place of articulation (not just the palatalization) of following postalveolars: с частью [ˈɕɕasʲtʲju] ('with a part'). In careful speech, this does not occur across word boundaries.

Russian has the rare features of nasals not typically assimilating place of articulation. For example, both /n/ and /nʲ/ appear before retroflex consonants: деньжонки [dʲɪnʲˈʐonkʲɪ] ('money' (scornful)) and ханжой [xɐnˈʐoj] ('hypocrite' instr.). In the same context, other coronal consonants are always plain. The velar nasal is an allophone before velar consonants in some words (функция [ˈfuŋk.t͡sɨjə] 'function'), but not in most other words like банк [bank] ('bank').

Consonant Clusters

Russian allows consonant clusters. Some, such as in встретить [ˈfstrʲetʲɪtʲ] ('to encounter'), can have as much as four segments. Other cluster types are also attested, some of which would be difficult for English speakers.

3 Segments	Russian	IPA	Translation
CCL	скрип	[skrʲip]	squeak
CCC*	ствол	[stvol]	(tree) trunk
LCL	верблюд	[vʲɪrˈblʲut]	camel
LCC	толстый	[ˈtolstɨj]	thick

For speakers who pronounce [ɕt͡ɕ] instead of [ɕɕ], words like общий ('common') also constitute clusters of this type.

2 Segments	Russian	IPA	Translation
CC	кость	[kosʲtʲ]	bone
LC	ртуть	[rtutʲ]	mercury
CL	слепой	[sʲlʲɪˈpoj]	blind
LL	горло	[ˈgorlə]	throat
CJ	дьяк	[dʲjak]	dyak
LJ	рьяный	[ˈrʲjanɨj]	zealous

If /j/ is considered a consonant in the coda position, then words like айва ('quince') contain semivowel+consonant clusters.

Clusters of four consonants are possible, but not very common, especially within a morpheme. Some potential clusters are deleted as well. For example, dental plosives are dropped between a dental continuant and a dental nasal: лестный [ˈlʲɛsnɨj] ('flattering').

Supplementary notes

/n/ and /nʲ/ are the only consonants that can be geminated.

The historic transformation of /g/ into /v/ in the genitive case (and also the accusative for animate entities) of masculine singular adjectives and pronouns is not reflected in the modern Russian orthography: его [jɪˈvo] ('his/him'), белого [ˈbʲɛ.lə.və] ('white' gen. sg.), синего [ˈsʲi.nʲɪ.və] ('blue' gen. sg.). Orthographic г also represents /x/ when it precedes other velar sounds.

Between any vowel and /i/ (excluding instances across affix boundaries but including unstressed vowels that have merged with /i/), /j/ may be dropped: аист [ˈa.ɪst] ('stork') and делает [ˈdʲɛləɪt] ('does').

Stress in Russian may fall on any syllable, and may shift within an inflexional paradigm: до́ма [ˈdo.mə] ('house' gen. sg.) vs дома́ [dɐˈma] ('houses'). The place of the stress in a word is determined by the interplay between the morphemes it contains, as some morphemes have underlying stress, while others do not. However, other than some compound words, such as морозоустойчивый [mɐˌrozəʊˈstojtɕɪvɨj] ('frost-resistant') only one syllable is stressed in a word. Russian also has an intonation pattern similar to that of English.

Non-open back vowels velarize preceding hard consonants: ты [tˠɨ] ('you' sing.). /o/ and /u/ labialize all consonants: бок [bʷok] ('side'), нёс [nʲʷos] ('he carried').

Historical sound changes

The modern phonological system of Russian is inherited from Common Slavonic, but underwent considerable innovation in the early historical period, before being largely settled by about 1400.

Like all Slavic languages, Russian was originally a language of open syllables. All syllables ended in vowels (as in Fijian and Hawaiian), and consonant clusters, in far lesser variety than today, existed only at the start of a syllable.

By the time of the earliest records, Old Russian already showed characteristic divergences from Common Slavonic. Major features of this stage include:

The loss of the nasal vowels (the yuses of ancient Cyrillic), which had themselves developed from Indo-European [-en-]/[-an-]/[-on-] before a consonant — usually dental or labial — and at word boundaries. Non-nasalized vowels took their place, possibly iotated or with softening of the preceding consonant:

• PIE: *h₁sónti
• Lat: sunt
• ComSl: *sǫtь
• OCS: бъіти
• Russian: суть [sutʲ] ('they are').

Borrowings in the Finno-Ugric languages with interpolated [-n-] after Common Slavonic nasal vowels have been taken to indicate that the nasal vowels did exist in East Slavic until some time possibly just before the historical period.

Simplification of Common Slavic *-dl-/-tl- to -l-:

• ComSl: *mydlo
• Polish: mydło
• Russian: мыло ['mɨ.lə] ('soap').

A tendency for greater maintenance of intermediate ancient [-s-], [-k-], etc. before frontal vowels, than in other Slavic languages, the so-called incomplete second and third palatalizations:

• Uk нозі /nozʲi/
• Russian: ноги [ˈno.gʲɪ] ('legs').

Pleophony or "full-voicing" (polnoglasie, 'полногласие' [pə.lnɐˈgla.sʲɪ.jə]), that is, the addition of vowels on either side of /l/ and /r/ between two consonants. Church Slavonic influence has made it less common in Russian than in modern Ukrainian and Belarusian:

• OCS: врабии *[ˈvra.bii]
• Russian: воробей [və.rɐˈbʲej] ('sparrow')
• Uk: Володимир /voloˈdɪmɪr/
• Russian: Владимир [vlɐˈdʲi.mʲɪr] ('Vladimir') (although the nickname form in Russian is still Володя [vɐˈlodʲə]).

Major phonological processes in the last thousand years have included the absence of the Slavonic open-syllable requirement, achieved in part through the loss of the ultra-short vowels, the so-called fall of the yers, which alternately lengthened and dropped (the yers are given conventional transcription rather than precise IPA symbols in the Old Russian pronunciations):

• OR: объ мьнѣ > R: обо мне ('about me')
• OR: сънъ /ˈsŭ.nŭ/ > R: сон [son] ('sleep' nom. sg.), cognate with Lat. somnus;
• OR: съна /sŭˈna/ > R: сна [sna] ('of sleep') (gen. sg.).

The loss of the yers has led to geminated consonants and a much greater variety of consonant clusters, with attendant voicing and/or devoicing in the assimilation:

• OR: къдѣ /kŭˈdě/ > R: где [gdʲɛ] ('where').

Consonant clusters thus created were often simplified:

• здравствуйте [ˈzdra.stvuj.tʲə] ('hello'), not *[ˈzdra.fstvuj.tʲə], although such a pronunciation could be affected in the archaic meaning be healthy
• сердце [ˈsʲɛ.rt͡sə] ('heart'), not *[ˈsʲɛ.rdt͡sə]
• солнце [ˈso.nt͡sə] ('sun'), not *[ˈso.lnt͡sə].

The development of OR ѣ /ě/ (conventional transcription) into /(j)e/, as seen above. This development has caused by far the greatest of all Russian spelling controversies. The timeline of the development of /ě/ into /e/ or /je/ has also been debated.

A greater variety of palatalized phonemes, and the systematic palatalization of consonants before /e/ and /i/.

Sometime between the twelfth and fourteenth century, the allophone of /i/ before velar consonants changed from [ɨ] to [i] with subsequent palatalization of the velars.

The retroflexing of postalveolars: /ʒ/ became [ʐ] and /ʃ/ become [ʂ]. This is considered a "hardening" since retroflex sounds are difficult to palatalize. At some point, /t͡s/ resisted palatalization, which is why it is also "hard" although phonetically it is no different than before. The sound represented by <щ> was much more commonly pronounced as /ɕt͡ɕ/ than it is today. Today's common and standard pronunciation of <щ> is /ɕɕ/.

The development of stressed /e/ into /o/ when between a palatalized consonant and a plain one:

• OR о чемъ ('about which' loc. sg.) > R о чём .

This has led to a number of alternations:

Word	Gloss	Word	Gloss
безупре́чность	irreproachability	упрёк	reproach
бере́чь	to protect	берёг	he protected
бере́зник	birch forest	берёза	birch tree
ве́дение	conducting	вёл	he conducted
ве́дреный	fine, good	вёдро	fine weather
весе́лье	merriment	весёлый	merry
вле́чь	to attract	влёк	he attracted
гре́бля	rowing	грёб	he rowed
гре́зить	to dream	грёза	a dream
дале́че	distantly	далёк	distant
двоеже́нец	bigamist	двоежёнство	bigamy
де́нь	day	подённо	by day
деше́вле	cheaper	дешёвый	cheap
е́ль	fir-tree	ёлка	fir-tree
жере́бчик	stallion (diminutive)	жерёбая	with foal
жечь	to burn	жёг	he burned
желть	yellow paint	жёлтый	yellow
зе́млю	earth (acc. sg.)	чернозём	black earth
изреше́чивать	to pierce with holes	решёта	sieves
кле́плет	he/she/it riviets	клёпаный	riveted
коле́сник	wheel-wright	колёса	wheels
коте́льная	boiler-room	котёл	boiler
ле́дник	refrigerator	лёд	ice
лечь	to lie down	лёг	he lay down
наве́ртит	he/she/it will twist	навёртывать	to twist
пе́нь	stump	пёнышек	dear, little stump
пере́дний	front (adj)	перёд	front (noun)
перекре́щивать	to cross	перекрёсток	cross-road
пе́рья	feathers	пёрышко	dear, little feather
пе́стрядь	colored cotton cloth	пёстрый	variegated
Пе́тя	Pete	Пётр	Peter
пе́чь	to bake	пёк	he baked
пле́ть	lash	плётка	lash
поме́лья	brooms	мёл	he swept
предре́чь	to foretell	предрёк	he foretold
пренебре́чь	to neglect	пренебрёг	he neglected
просве́рливать	to bore, drill	свёрла	borers, drills
проче́сть	to read	прочёл	he read
пче́льник	apiary	пчёлы	bees
реме́нь	strap	ремённый	made of straps
реме́сленник	artisan	ремёсла	trades
роже́чник	horn-player	рожо́к	horn
сельский	rural	сёла	villages
семь	seven	сам-сём	with six others
се́стрин	sister's	сёстры	sisters
смерть	death	мёртвый	dead
созве́дие	constellation	звёзды	stars
спле́тня	gossip	сплётка	gossip
стере́чь	to guard	стерёг	he guarded
тве́рдь	firm foundation	твёрдый	hard, firm
те́мень	darkness	тёмный	dark
те́плит	to light	тёплый	warm
те́рнии	thorns	тёрн	blackthorn
тете́рька	heath hen	тетёрка	heath hen
те́чь	to flow	тёк	it flowed
тре́плет	wears out	трёпаный	worn out
тяже́лее	heavier	тяжёлый	heavy
Фе́дя	Ted	Фёдор	Theodore
че́рнь	niello	чёрный	black
че́рти	devils	чёрт	devil
че́сть	honor	почёт	honor
шерсть	hair	шёрстка	hair (diminutive)
шесть	six	сам-шо́ст	with five others
щель	chink	щёлка	chink

Loanwords from Church Slavonic reintroduced /e/ between a soft consonant and a hard one, including:

• лед (from OCS лєдъ) vs лёд ('ice')
• лев vs лёв ('lion')
• небо vs нёбо ('sky')
• хребе́т vs. хребёт ('spine')

A number of Russian's phonological features are attributable to the introduction of loanwords (especially from non-Slavic languages), including:

• Sequences of two vowels within a morpheme.
• поэт [pɐˈɛt] ('poet'). From French poète.
• траур [ˈtraur] ('mourning').
• Most instances of word-initial /e/.
• эра [ˈɛrə] ('era'). From German Ära
• Word-initial /a/.
• авеню [ɐvʲɪˈnʲu] ('avenue').
• афера [ɐˈfʲɛrə] ('swindle').
• The phoneme /f/ (see Ef (Cyrillic) for more information).
• фонема [fɐˈnʲɛmə] ('phoneme'). From Greek φώνημα.
• эфир [ɪˈfʲir] ('ether'). From Greek Αἰθήρ.
• фиаско [fʲɪˈaskə] ('fiasco'). From Italian fiasco.
• The occurrence of non-palatalized consonants before /e/.
• The sequence /dʐ/ within a morpheme.
• джин [dʐin] ('gin') from English.
• джаз [dʐas] ('jazz) from English.

Many double consonants have become degeminated, though they are still written with two letters in the orthography.

See also

• Russian alphabet,
• Russian orthography
• Reforms of Russian orthography
• List of Russian language topics
• List of phonetics topics

References

Bibliography

Further reading

• Hamilton, William S. (1980). Introduction to Russian Phonology and Word Structure. Slavica Publishers.