What alphabet does Albanian use, and how many letters does it have?

Albanian uses a Latin-based alphabet of 36 letters — 7 vowels and 29 consonants. It was standardised at the Congress of Manastir in 1908, which chose the unified Latin script still used today.

Two of the letters carry diacritics: ç (like the "ch" in "church") and ë (a soft, neutral vowel similar to the "a" in "about", often barely pronounced at the end of a word). The alphabet also includes nine digraphs — dh, gj, ll, nj, rr, sh, th, xh, and zh — each treated as a single letter representing one sound.

The best part for learners is that the alphabet is essentially phonetic: each letter maps to one consistent sound. Once you know the 36 letters, you can read and pronounce almost any Albanian word on sight, with none of the spelling guesswork that English demands.