Digraphs

Polish additionally uses the digraphs ch, cz, dz, dź, dż, rz, and sz. Combinations of certain consonants with the letter i before a vowel can be considered digraphs: ci as a positional variant of ć, si as a positional variant of ś, zi as a positional variant of ź, and ni as a positional variant of ń (but see a special remark on ni below); and there is also one trigraph dzi as a positional variant of dź. These are not given any special treatment in alphabetical ordering. For example, ch is treated simply as c followed by h, and not as a single letter as in Czech or Slovak (e.g. Chojnice only has its first letter capitalised, and is sorted after Canki and before Cieszyn).

Voicing and devoicing

Voiced consonant letters frequently come to represent voiceless sounds (as shown in the above tables). This is due to the neutralization that occurs at the end of words and in certain consonant clusters; for example, the ⟨b⟩ in klub ("club") is pronounced like a ⟨p⟩, and the ⟨rz⟩ in prze- sounds like ⟨sz⟩. Less frequently, voiceless consonant letters can represent voiced sounds; for example, the ⟨k⟩ in także ("also") is pronounced like a ⟨g⟩. The conditions for this neutralization are described under Voicing and devoicing in the article on Polish phonology.

Palatal and palatalized consonants

The spelling rule for the alveolo-palatal sounds /ɕ/, /ʑ/, /t͡ɕ/, /d͡ʑ/ and /ɲ/ is as follows: before the vowel ⟨i⟩ the plain letters ⟨s z c dz n⟩ are used; before other vowels the combinations ⟨si zi ci dzi ni⟩ are used; when not followed by a vowel the diacritic forms ⟨ś ź ć dź ń⟩ are used. For example, the ⟨s⟩ in siwy ("grey-haired"), the ⟨si⟩ in siarka ("sulphur") and the ⟨ś⟩ in święty ("holy") all represent the sound /ɕ/.

Special attention should be paid to ⟨n⟩ before ⟨i⟩ plus a vowel. In words of foreign origin the ⟨i⟩ causes the palatalization of the preceding consonant ⟨n⟩ to /ɲ/, and it is pronounced as /j/. This situation occurs when the corresponding genitive form ends in -nii, pronounced as /ɲji/, not with -ni, pronounced as /ɲi/ (which is a situation typical to the words of Polish origin). For examples, see the table in the next section.

According to one system, similar principles apply to the palatalized consonants /kʲ/, /ɡʲ/ and /xʲ/, except that these can only occur before vowels. The spellings are thus ⟨k g (c)h⟩ before ⟨i⟩, and ⟨ki gi (c)hi⟩ otherwise. For example, the ⟨k⟩ in kim ("whom", instr.) and the ⟨ki⟩ in kiedy both represent /kʲ/. In the system without the palatalized velars, they are analyzed as /k/, /ɡ/ and /x/ before /i/ and /kj/, /ɡj/ and /xj/ before other vowels.

Other issues with i and j

Except in the cases mentioned in the previous paragraph, the letter ⟨i⟩ if followed by another vowel in the same word usually represents /j/, but it also has the palatalizing effect on the previous consonant. For example, pies ("dog") is pronounced [pʲjɛs] (/pjɛs/). Some words with ⟨n⟩ before ⟨i⟩ plus a vowel also follow this pattern (see below). In fact i is the usual spelling of /j/ between a preceding consonant and a following vowel. The letter ⟨j⟩ normally appears in this position only after ⟨c⟩, ⟨s⟩ and ⟨z⟩ if the palatalization effect described above has to be avoided (as in presja "pressure", Azja "Asia", lekcja "lesson", and the common suffixes -cja "-tion", -zja "-sion": stacja "station", wizja "vision"). The letter ⟨j⟩ after consonants is also used in concatenation of two words if the second word in the pair starts with ⟨j⟩, e.g. wjazd "entrance" originates from w + jazd(a). The pronunciation of the sequence wja (in wjazd) is the same as the pronunciation of wia (in wiadro "bucket").

The ending -ii which appears in the inflected forms of some nouns of foreign origin, which have -ia in the nominative case (always after ⟨g⟩, ⟨k⟩, ⟨l⟩, and ⟨r⟩; sometimes after ⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩, and other consonants), is pronounced as [ji], with the palatalization of the preceding consonant. For example, dalii (genitive of dalia "dalia"), Bułgarii (genitive of Bułgaria "Bulgaria"), chemii (genitive of chemia "chemistry"), religii (genitive of religia "religion"), amfibii (genitive of amfibia "amphibia"). The common pronunciation is [i]. This is why children commonly misspell and write -i in the inflected forms as armii, Danii or hypercorrectly write ziemii instead of ziemi (words of Polish origin do not have the ending -ii but simple -i, e.g. ziemi, genitive of ziemia).

In some rare cases, however, when the consonant is preceded by another consonant, -ii may be pronounced as [i], but the preceding consonant is still palatalized, for example, Anglii (genitive of Anglia "England") is pronounced [anɡlʲi]. (The spelling Angli, very frequently met with on the Internet, is simply an error in orthography, caused by this pronunciation.)

A special situation applies to ⟨n⟩: it has the full palatalization to [ɲ] before -ii which is pronounced as [ji] – and such a situation occurs only when the corresponding nominative form in -nia is pronounced as [ɲja], not as [ɲa].

For example (pay attention to the upper- and lower-case letters):

The ending -ji, is always pronounced as /ji/. It appears only after c, s and z. Pronunciation of it as a simple /i/ is considered a pronunciation error. For example, presji (genitive of presja "pressure") is /prɛsji/; poezji (genitive of poezja "poetry") is /pɔɛzji/; racji (genitive of racja "reason") is /rat͡sji/.

Nasal vowels

The letters ⟨ą⟩ and ⟨ę⟩, when followed by plosives and affricates, represent an oral vowel followed by a nasal consonant, rather than a nasal vowel. For example, ⟨ą⟩ in dąb ("oak") is pronounced /ɔm/, and ⟨ę⟩ in tęcza ("rainbow") is pronounced /ɛn/ (the nasal assimilates with the following consonant). When followed by ⟨l⟩ or ⟨ł⟩, and in the case of ⟨ę⟩, also at the end of words by most speakers (in a situation where the speaker pronounces the vowel nasally, it is nasalized only lightly),^[4] these letters are pronounced as just /ɔ/ or /ɛ/.

Homophonic spellings

Apart from the cases in the sections above, there are three sounds in Polish that can be spelt in two different ways, depending on the word. Those result from historical sound changes. The correct spelling can often be deduced from the spelling of other morphological forms of the word or cognates in Polish or in other Slavic languages.

• /x/ can be spelt either ⟨h⟩ or ⟨ch⟩.
  • ⟨h⟩ only occurs in loanwords; however, many of them have been nativized and are not perceived as loanwords. ⟨h⟩ is used:
    • when cognate words have the letter ⟨g⟩, ⟨ż⟩ or ⟨z⟩, e.g.:

      wahadło – waga

      druh – drużyna

      błahy – błazen

    • when the same letter is used in the language from which the word was borrowed, e.g. Greek prefixes hekto-, hetero-, homo-, hipo-, hiper-, hydro-, also honor, historia, herbata, etc.
  • ⟨ch⟩ is used:
    • in all native words, e.g. chyba, chrust, chrapać, chować, chcieć
    • when the same digraph is used in the language from which the word was borrowed, e.g. chór, echo, charakter, chronologia, etc.
• /u/ can be spelt ⟨u⟩ or ⟨ó⟩; the spelling ⟨ó⟩ indicates that the sound developed from the historical long /oː/.
  • ⟨u⟩ is used:
    • usually at the beginning of a word (except for ósemka, ósmy, ów, ówczesny, ówdzie)
    • always at the end of a word
    • in the endings -uch, -ucha, -uchna, -uchny, -uga, -ula, -ulec, -ulek, -uleńka, -ulka, -ulo, -un, -unek, -uni, -unia, -unio, -ur, -us, -usi, -usieńki, -usia, -uszek, -uszka, -uszko, -uś, -utki
  • ⟨ó⟩ is used:
    • when cognate words or other morphological forms have the letter ⟨o⟩, ⟨e⟩ or ⟨a⟩, e.g.:

      mróz – mrozu

      wiózł – wieźć

      skrócić – skracać

    • in the endings -ów, -ówka, -ówna (except for zasuwka, skuwka, wsuwka)
• /ʐ/ can be spelt either ⟨ż⟩ or ⟨rz⟩; the spelling ⟨rz⟩ indicates that the sound developed from /r̝/ (cf. Czech ⟨ř⟩).
  • ⟨ż⟩ is used:
    • when cognate words or other morphological forms have the letter/digraph ⟨g⟩, ⟨dz⟩, ⟨h⟩, ⟨z⟩, ⟨ź⟩, ⟨s⟩, e.g.:

      może – mogę

      mosiężny – mosiądz

      drużyna – druh

      każe – kazać

      wożę – woźnica

      bliżej – blisko

    • in the particle że, e.g. skądże, tenże, także
    • after ⟨l⟩, ⟨ł⟩, ⟨r⟩, e.g.:

      lżej

      łże

      rżysko

    • in loanwords, especially from French, e.g.:

      rewanż

      żakiet

      garaż

    • when cognates in other Slavic languages contain the sound /ʐ/ or /ʒ/, e.g. żuraw – Russian журавль
  • ⟨rz⟩ is used:
    • when cognate words or other morphological forms have the letter ⟨r⟩, e.g. morze – morski, karze – kara
    • usually after ⟨p⟩, ⟨b⟩, ⟨t⟩, ⟨d⟩, ⟨k⟩, ⟨g⟩, ⟨ch⟩, ⟨j⟩, ⟨w⟩, e.g.:

      przygoda

      brzeg

      trzy

      drzewo

      krzywy

      grzywa

      chrzest

      ujrzeć

      wrzeć

    • when cognates in other Slavic languages contain the sound /r/ or /r̝/, e.g. rzeka – Russian река^[5]

Other points

The letter ⟨u⟩ represents /w/ in the digraphs ⟨au⟩ and ⟨eu⟩ in loanwords, for example autor, Europa; but not in native words, like nauka, pronounced [naˈu.ka].

There are certain clusters where a written consonant would not normally be pronounced. For example, the ⟨ł⟩ in the words mógł ("could") and jabłko ("apple") is omitted in ordinary speech.