A diphthong is a single vowel that glides from one position to another inside one syllable — your tongue starts in one place and slides to another without a break. Afrikaans has a compact set of them, and most map loosely onto English, with one glaring exception: ui, a front-rounded glide that English does not have at all and that learners struggle with for months. This page covers the gliding vowels — ei/y, ou, ui, plus the longer glides aai, ooi, oei, eeu — and the eu monophthong, which is not strictly a diphthong but is almost always taught alongside them because English speakers hear it as one. The pure long and short vowels (like aa and oo) are not diphthongs and live on long and short vowels.
The core diphthongs at a glance
| Spelling | IPA | Example | English | Rough English anchor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ei / y | [əi] | seil / my | sail / my | the vowel in "play," but starting from a schwa |
| ou | [œu] | koud | cold | like "oh," but starting lower and rounder |
| ui | [œy] | huis | house | no English equivalent — see below |
| aai | [ɑːi] | baie | much / very | long "ah" gliding to "ee" |
| ooi | [oːi] | rooi | red | long "oh" gliding to "ee" |
| oei | [ui] | koei | cow | "oo" gliding to "ee" |
| eeu | [eːu] | leeu | lion | long "ay" gliding to "oo" |
ei and y: identical sound, two spellings
This is the single most important fact on the page for spelling. ei and y are pronounced exactly the same — both are [əi], a glide that starts from the dull schwa vowel and rises toward "ee." There is no audible difference whatsoever between the ei of seil ("sail") and the y of my ("my"). You cannot hear which spelling a word uses; you have to know it.
Die seil van die boot klap hard in die wind.
The sail of the boat flaps loudly in the wind.
My fiets is stukkend, so ek loop vandag.
My bike is broken, so I'm walking today.
Hy het self gesê hy weet nie hoekom nie.
He himself said he doesn't know why.
Because the sound is identical, the spelling is pure memorisation, exactly the way English speakers must memorise that "sail" and "sale" sound alike but are spelled differently. Roughly, ei turns up in many native and older words (seil, klein, reis, sleg — no, sleg has no diphthong; reis, lei, vlei), while y turns up in another large set (my, byt, wyn, tyd, prys). There is no rule that reliably predicts which; the full word lists and the few patterns that do exist are on ei vs y.
Ons reis volgende week met die trein na die kus.
We're travelling by train to the coast next week.
Die wyn is te duur — kom ons koop eerder iets anders.
The wine is too expensive — let's rather buy something else.
A common English-speaker error is to read y as English "ee" (so my comes out as "mee"). In Afrikaans the y is never "ee" — it is the [əi] glide. The clear "ee" sound belongs to ie, a different spelling entirely (see i vs ie).
ou: the glide in koud
ou is [œu] — it starts from a low, rounded vowel and glides up toward "oo." It is close to the English "ow"-without-the-mouth-opening in "low" or "go," but it begins lower and more rounded than the English vowel, so it sounds darker.
Dis ysig koud buite — trek 'n warm jas aan.
It's freezing cold outside — put on a warm coat.
Hou jou hande by jou, dis nie joune nie.
Keep your hands to yourself, it's not yours.
Die ou man by die hoek verkoop blomme.
The old man on the corner sells flowers.
Note that jou ("your/you") and jy ("you") have different vowels — jou is the ou glide [œu], jy is the y glide [əi]. Keeping them distinct in your ear keeps the pronouns distinct.
ui: the hardest diphthong in Afrikaans
If one sound earns Afrikaans its reputation for difficulty, it is ui [œy]. It is a front-rounded glide: your lips stay rounded throughout (as if saying "oo"), but your tongue stays forward (as if saying "ee"). English has no front-rounded vowels at all, so there is no anchor to copy — you have to build the sound from scratch.
Ons huis is net om die hoek, kom kuier gerus.
Our house is just around the corner, do come visit.
Kom uit die reën — jy word sopnat!
Come out of the rain — you're getting soaked!
Sy het die uie fyn gekap vir die sop.
She finely chopped the onions for the soup.
Here is a way to find it. Say the English word "house," then freeze on the vowel and round your lips harder while keeping your tongue forward. Do not let the sound collapse into either "oo" (the back-rounded English vowel) or "ee." The target sits between them: lips rounded, tongue front. Two errors are near-universal among English speakers:
- Pronouncing ui like English "oo" — so huis becomes "hoos." This drops the front tongue position entirely.
- Pronouncing ui like "wee" or " wuee" — so uit becomes "weet." This adds a [w] glide that isn't there and loses the rounding.
The long glides: aai, ooi, oei, eeu
These are longer diphthongs that start from a long vowel and glide into [i] or [u]. They are easier than ui because each piece exists in English.
- aai [ɑːi] — long "ah" gliding to "ee," as in baie ("very/much"), draai ("turn"), gaan — no, gaan has no glide; draai, swaai, naai.
- ooi [oːi] — long "oh" gliding to "ee," as in rooi ("red"), mooi ("pretty"), gooi ("throw").
- oei [ui] — "oo" gliding to "ee," as in koei ("cow"), moeg — no; koei, groei ("grow"), roei ("row").
- eeu [eːu] — long "ay" gliding to "oo," as in leeu ("lion"), eeu ("century"), sneeu ("snow").
Baie dankie vir die heerlike ete!
Thank you very much for the lovely meal!
Die rooi rok lyk pragtig op jou.
The red dress looks gorgeous on you.
Daar staan 'n koei middel in die pad.
There's a cow standing in the middle of the road.
In die winter val daar soms sneeu op die berge.
In winter it sometimes snows on the mountains.
Watch baie: it is the everyday word for "very" and "much," and its first syllable is the aai glide — baie is "BUY-uh," not "BAY-ee." Getting baie right instantly makes your Afrikaans sound less foreign, because you say it constantly.
eu: a monophthong that travels with the diphthongs
eu is not a diphthong — it is a long, steady front-rounded monophthong [øː], the same lips-rounded-tongue-forward posture as ui but held still instead of gliding. It is grouped here only because English speakers, lacking the sound, instinctively hear it as a glide and try to "slide" it like a diphthong. Don't. Hold it steady.
Haar seun begin volgende jaar met skool.
Her son starts school next year.
Die deur is gesluit — ons sal moet aanklop.
The door is locked — we'll have to knock.
The relationship is worth seeing as a pair: ui is the gliding front-rounded vowel; eu is the steady front-rounded vowel. Master the rounded-lips-forward-tongue posture once and both fall into place. More on the front-rounded family is on eu and front-rounded vowels.
Common mistakes
❌ huis pronounced 'hoos'
Incorrect — ui is front-rounded [œy], not the back vowel 'oo'; keep the tongue forward.
✅ huis with a front-rounded [œy]
house
❌ uit pronounced 'weet'
Incorrect — there is no [w] glide and no 'ee'; ui is a single front-rounded glide.
✅ uit [œyt]
out
❌ my pronounced 'mee'
Incorrect — y is the glide [əi], never English 'ee'; that sound is spelled ie.
✅ my [məi]
my
❌ baie pronounced 'BAY-ee'
Incorrect — the first syllable is the aai glide [ɑːi]: 'BUY-uh'.
✅ baie [ˈbɑːiə]
very / much
❌ seun glided like a diphthong
Incorrect — eu is a steady monophthong [øː], held still, not slid.
✅ seun [søːn]
son
Key takeaways
- ei and y are homophones — both [əi], the schwa-to-"ee" glide; you cannot hear the difference, so the spelling must be memorised (see ei vs y).
- ui [œy] is the hardest sound: front-rounded, with no English equivalent. Build it by rounding the lips for "oo" and saying "ee" through them. Don't say "oo" or "wee."
- ou [œu] is the dark "ow" of koud, jou, oud; keep jou (ou) distinct from jy (y).
- The long glides aai, ooi, oei, eeu each combine sounds English already has; get baie [ɑːi] right because you say it constantly.
- eu [øː] is a steady front-rounded monophthong, not a glide — same posture as ui but held still; see eu and front-rounded vowels.
- Diphthongs are not covered by the doubling rules of the pure vowels; they are their own spelled units.
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Start learning Afrikaans→Related Topics
- Long and Short VowelsA1 — How Afrikaans separates long from short vowels in both sound and spelling, why a single vowel can mean a different word from a doubled one, and why training your ear fixes your spelling at the same time.
- Ei vs Y: The Other Homophone TrapA2 — Ei and y spell exactly the same diphthong, so my and seil rhyme perfectly — this page gives the etymological split and a learnable core list of which words take which.
- The Vowels EU and U: Front RoundedA2 — How to pronounce the front rounded vowels written eu (seun, deur, neus) and u (brug, put, nuus) — sounds with no English equivalent, produced by rounding the lips on a front vowel, the second-hardest thing in Afrikaans after the g.
- Circumflex Vowels: ê, ô, î, ûA2 — The circumflex (kappie) marks a long, open vowel quality distinct from both the short vowel and the plain doubled vowel — and it often signals a historically dropped g.
- Spelling i vs ieB1 — When to write a single i and when to write ie — short i [ə] (sit, kind, vir) versus long ie [i] (sien, vier, hier) — plus how loanwords keep foreign vowel spellings and why ie reliably signals length.
- Afrikaans Pronunciation: OverviewA1 — A map of the Afrikaans sound system for English speakers — the guttural g, the v/w/f trap, vowel length, and the diacritics — and what to unlearn first.