Zhe or Že (Ж ж; italics: Ж ж) is a letter of the Cyrillic script. It commonly represents the voiced retroflex sibilant /ʐ/ (listen). It is also often used with D (Д) to approximate the sound in English of the Latin letter
In Modern Russian, the letter "ъ" is called the hard sign (твёрдый знак / tvjordyj znak).
Yu or Ju (Ю ю; italics: Ю ю) is a letter of the Cyrillic script used in East Slavic and Bulgarian alphabets. In English, Yu is commonly romanized as ⟨yu⟩ (or ⟨ju⟩). In turn, ⟨ю⟩ is used, where is available, in transcriptions of English letter ⟨u⟩ (in open syllables), and also of the ⟨ew⟩ digraph.
The Cyrillic letter Б (Be) is romanized using the Latin letter B.
Ge, ghe, or he (Г г; italics: Г г) is a letter of the Cyrillic script. It represents the voiced velar plosive /ɡ/, like ⟨g⟩ in "gift", or the voiced glottal fricative [ɦ], like ⟨h⟩ in "heft". It is generally romanized using the Latin letter g or h, depending on the source language.
Ef or Fe (Ф ф; italics: Ф ф) is a Cyrillic letter, commonly representing the voiceless labiodental fricative /f/, like the pronunciation of ⟨f⟩ in "fill, flee, or fall". The Cyrillic letter Ef is romanized as ⟨f⟩.
Pe (П п; italics: П п) is a letter of the Cyrillic script. It commonly represents the unaspirated voiceless bilabial plosive /p/, like the pronunciation of ⟨p⟩ in "spin".
The soft sign (Ь, ь, italics Ь, ь), also known as the front yer, front jer, or er malak (lit. "small er") is a letter of the Cyrillic script. In Old Church Slavonic, it represented a short (or "reduced") front vowel.
Today, both the Hard sign (Ъ) and the Soft sign (Ь) are used to separate a consonant and a vowel (mostly Я, Ё, Е, Ю), only the Hard sign (Ъ) separates a Hard consonant and a vowel, and the Soft sign (Ь) separates a Soft consonant and a vowel. In some other languages, a similar function is given to an apostrophe.
Э э (Э э; italics: Э э; also known as backwards ye, from Russian е оборо́тное, ye oborótnoye, [ˈjɛ ɐbɐˈrotnəjə]) is a letter found in three Slavic languages: Russian, Belarusian, and West Polesian. It represents the vowels [e] and [ɛ], as the e in the word "editor".
The Russian letter "э" is pronounced [e] like in the word "edit". But be careful, remember that the Russian letter "e" is pronounced [ye] like in "yellow".
Verb. ю • (i͡u) to have; to possess; there is/are.
O with ogonek (majuscule: Ǫ, minuscule: ǫ) is a letter of the Latin alphabet formed by addition of the ogonek to the letter O. It is used in Western Apache, Mescalero-Chiricahua, Muscogee, Dadibi, Gwichʼin, Erie, and Navajo.
However, this new rule was applied inconsistently throughout the Soviet period. Therefore, today, we still use Ъ when separating the prefix and root of a word, but only if the root begins with Е, Ё, Ю or Я.
The letter "ъ" does not have any sound (like as "ь"). But its function is to harden the letter that comes before it (remember that "ь" softens). This letter can only be followed by е, ё, я, ю, and thanks to "ъ", they are pronounced very clearly.
Yeru or Eru (Ы ы; italics: Ы ы), usually called Y [ɨ] in modern Russian or Yery or Ery historically and in modern Church Slavonic, is a letter in the Cyrillic script.
ь and ъ are used to make a letter such as 'л' softer, or separate two colliding letters. The two serve the same purpose and will be often mixed up. Ы is not used to separate anything or mak something softer. In fact, you will hear it makes the sound harder.
Letters: Ь
This letter is called “soft sign” (м'який знак in Ukrainian). As the name of the letter suggests, its purpose is to soften the sound of the previous letter. Usually, the difference between the softened and not-softened sound is very difficult to notice for a foreign ear.
Pay attention to the pronunciation of the vowels ы and и. Note that ы sounds like [ i ] in ill, whereas И и sounds like [ee] in meet. The letter ы never occurs as the first letter in the word, therefore it is never capitalized.
En (Н н; italics: Н н) is a letter of the Cyrillic script. It commonly represents the dental nasal consonant /n/, like the pronunciation of ⟨n⟩ in "neat".
There are 33 letters in the Russian alphabet. 10 vowels (а, э, ы, у, о, я, е, ё, ю, и), 21 consonants (б, в, г, д, ж, з, к, л, м, н, п, р, с, т, ф, х, ц, ч, ш, щ, and the consonant й which is sometimes a semivowel) and 2 pronunciation signs (the “soft sign” ь and the “hard sign” ъ).