The Italian alphabet
Italian uses 21 letters — the Latin alphabet minus J, K, W, X, Y. (Those five only show up in foreign loanwords like jeans or taxi.) Italian spelling is rule-bound: once you know the rules, you can pronounce a word the moment you see it. Don't try to memorize the alphabet today — let the letters arrive one word at a time.
Vowels — clean and stable
A, I, U each have one sound: ah, ee, oo. E and O each have two flavors (open and closed) but at A1 the difference is barely audible — don't worry about it. casa = KAH-zah, sì = see, uno = OO-no, bene = BEH-neh, otto = OT-to. No diphthongs that wander like in English.
C and G — the soft/hard rule
C is hard (like English 'k') before A, O, U: casa, cosa (thing), cuoco (cook). It softens to 'ch' before E or I: ciao = CHOW, cena (dinner) = CHE-na. G mirrors the same rule: hard ('g' in 'go') before A/O/U — gatto, gondola — soft ('j' in 'jam') before E/I — gelato = je-LA-to, gentile = jen-TEE-leh.
CH, GH — putting the hardness back
If you need a hard C or G in front of E or I, Italian writes ch or gh. chi = kee (who), che = keh (what / that), spaghetti = spa-GHET-tee, funghi = FOON-ghee (mushrooms). The H itself is silent — its only job is to keep the C or G from going soft.
GLI, GN, SC — three special clusters
gli sounds like the 'lli' in 'million': figlio (son) = FEEL-yo, famiglia (family) = fa-MEEL-ya. gn is the same as Spanish ñ or French gn — like 'ny' in canyon: gnocchi = NYOK-kee, bagno (bathroom) = BAH-nyo. sc before E/I sounds like English 'sh': pesce (fish) = PEH-sheh, sciare (to ski) = SHA-reh. Before A/O/U it's just plain 'sk': scuola (school) = SKWO-la.
H is silent, doubled letters are loud
The letter H is never pronounced on its own — it only modifies neighboring letters (as in chi, gh) or sits silent in forms of the verb 'to have': ho, hai, ha. Doubled consonants ARE pronounced: hold the sound longer. anno (year) and ano (a different word) are not the same — pizza, caffè, bello all have audibly long consonants.
Stress and accent marks
Most Italian words stress the second-to-last syllable: casa = KA-sa, gelato = je-LA-to. When the stress falls on the LAST syllable, Italian writes a grave accent: città (city) = chit-TA, caffè = kaf-FEH, perché (because) = per-KEH. Words like musica, telefono stress the third-to-last syllable — you just have to learn those.
