ö, ő, ü, and ű: Forms and Core Pattern | Hungarian Grammar

The letters ö, ő, ü, and ű represent four separate vowels in modern standard Hungarian. All four are pronounced with the tongue toward the front of the mouth and the lips rounded. The two dots indicate a short vowel, while the double acute accent indicates its long partner: ö–ő and ü–ű. This page establishes their core form; meanings and usage and difficult contrasts are treated separately.

The compact paradigm

Letter	IPA	Length	Production cue	Example
ö	/ø/	short	Use a close-mid front tongue position and round the lips	öt “five”
ő	/øː/	long	Hold the same rounded vowel longer	ő “he/she”
ü	/y/	short	Say i while rounding the lips	ül “sits”
ű	/yː/	long	Hold the same rounded vowel longer	űr “space”

The English language has no stable equivalent for these four phonemes in most varieties. English speakers often substitute the vowel of bird for ö or the vowel of food for ü. Neither works: the tongue must remain forward, and the lips—not a movement of the tongue toward the back—supply the rounding.

How to produce them

For ö, place the tongue slightly higher than for Hungarian e /ɛ/, at a close-mid front position, then round your lips without pulling the tongue backward. For ü, begin with Hungarian i /i/ as in ki “who,” then round the lips while keeping the tongue exactly where it is. Once the short qualities are stable, produce ő and ű by sustaining them. Do not turn them into glides: ő is one long, steady vowel, not “eu,” and ű is not English “you.”

Öt körül érünk oda, ha nem lesz nagy forgalom.

We’ll get there around five if the traffic isn’t heavy.

Ő küldte el tegnap a végleges időpontot.

He was the one who sent the confirmed time yesterday.

Üljünk le az ablak mellé, ott világosabb.

Let’s sit by the window; it’s brighter there.

Indulás előtt fűtsd be egy kicsit a szobát.

Warm the room up a little before we leave.

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Length is not emphasis. Hungarian normally stresses the first syllable of a word, but a later ő or ű must still be long: időpont “time/date” is stressed on i-, while ő remains long.

Exact duration varies with speaking rate, so “twice as long” is only a practice cue, not a stopwatch rule. What matters is a reliable contrast: the long vowel must not collapse into the short one in the same context.

The four vowels in harmony

All four are front vowels, so a word containing only these vowels normally selects a front suffix. Many suffixes have only a back form and a front form. Thus -ban/-ben “in” gives dobozban “in the box” but tükörben “in the mirror.” The suffix uses e even after a rounded vowel because this suffix simply has no rounded third form.

Some common suffixes have three forms. Their front form distinguishes unrounded and rounded stems:

Suffix set	Back	Front unrounded	Front rounded
“to/toward”	-hoz: baráthoz	-hez: képhez	-höz: földhöz
“on”	-on: asztalon	-en: széken	-ön: földön
“times”	-szor: hatszor	-szer: kétszer	-ször: ötször

A kulcs a tükör mögötti kis polcon van.

The key is on the little shelf behind the mirror.

Ebéd után elsétálunk a könyvesbolthoz.

After lunch, we’ll walk over to the bookshop.

Már háromszor szóltam, hogy csukd be az ajtót.

I’ve already told you three times to close the door.

The final relevant vowel usually determines rounding in a three-way suffix. Compare tükörhöz, with final ö and therefore -höz, but füzethez, where final e calls for -hez even though the first vowel is ü.

Ezt a rajzot is tedd hozzá a füzethez.

Add this drawing to the notebook too.

The main exceptions involve words containing only the neutral vowels i, í, and é. A few common stems take back suffixes despite their written front vowels, for example hídhoz “to the bridge” and férfihoz “to the man.” The vowel e, by contrast, normally triggers front harmony, and ö, ő, ü, and ű are especially strong front-harmony signals. Compounds normally follow their final member: vasútállomáshoz “to the railway station” follows back-vowel állomás, not the earlier ű.

Spelling is structural

Hungarian spelling is highly regular only when every letter unit is counted correctly. The double acute accent is not decorative, and a consonant multigraph is not a loose cluster of English letters. In gyönyörű “beautiful,” gy and ny are each single consonant letters, ö is short, and the final ű is long. The regular word stress falls on the first syllable.

Gyönyörű lett a kert, mióta több időt töltesz vele.

The garden has become beautiful since you started spending more time on it.

Segmentation exercise

Divide each form into a stem and suffix, then explain the suffix vowel.

könyvhöz
tükörben
füzethez
szülőktől

Answers: (1) könyv + -höz: the final stem vowel is rounded ö, and this three-way suffix has a rounded form. (2) tükör + -ben: the stem is front, but -ban/-ben has only two forms. (3) füzet + -hez: final e is front unrounded, so the suffix is -hez. (4) szülő + -k + -től: -k marks plural and -tól/-től selects its front form. The ő in the stem remains long.

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Learn a suffix as a set—-hoz/-hez/-höz—rather than as one basic form plus vague “sound changes.” Each written allomorph is part of the grammatical pattern.

Common Mistakes

1. Replacing ü with English “oo.”

❌ A tükör szót hátsó u hanggal ejtem.

Incorrect — pronouncing tükör with a back English ‘oo’ vowel loses front rounding.

✅ A tükör mindkét magánhangzója elöl képzett és ajakkerekítéses.

Both vowels in tükör are front vowels pronounced with rounded lips.

2. Ignoring phonemic length.

❌ Öt percig vártam ot.

Incorrect — ot cannot replace őt; vowel length distinguishes the pronoun from öt ‘five.’

✅ Öt percig vártam őt.

I waited for him for five minutes.

3. Letting a long vowel attract stress.

❌ A gyönyörű szóban az utolsó, hosszú ű-re teszem a hangsúlyt.

Incorrect — the long final vowel does not receive regular word stress.

✅ A gyönyörű első szótagja hangsúlyos, a végső ű pedig hosszú.

The first syllable of gyönyörű is stressed, while the final ű is long.

4. Inventing a rounded form for every front suffix.

❌ Az arcod a tükörbön látszik.

Incorrect — the inessive suffix has no -bön form.

✅ Az arcod a tükörben látszik.

Your face is visible in the mirror.

Key Takeaways

Ö–ő form one short–long pair, and ü–ű form another. Keep the tongue forward, add lip rounding, and sustain the double-acute vowels without moving stress. In morphology, all four signal front harmony, but only suffixes with a three-way paradigm have a special rounded form.

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