Symbols
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Luxembourgish alphabet
The 26 letters in alphabetical order, capital and small, with the three accented letters in line: é (acute) for the closed e of schéin and Léiw, and the two dots on ä (Äppel, Äddi) and ë (Lëtzebuerg). Accented letters sort with their plain letter.
Quotation marks and apostrophe
Luxembourgish quotes the German way, „…“ with ‚…‘ inside; the ’ is the typographic apostrophe of d’Kanner and d’Lëtzebuerger Sprooch.
Currency
Luxembourg pays in euros, written with a decimal comma: 12,50 €.
Where it's spoken
Luxembourgish is the national language of Luxembourg; the red lion, de Roude Léiw, is the country's emblem and the nickname of its national football team.
On the map
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The Luxembourgish alphabet: A to Z plus ä, é and ë
Luxembourgish, Lëtzebuergesch in the language itself, is written with the Latin alphabet, A a to Z z in the usual order, and three letters with accents: ä, é and ë. They do not count as separate letters of the alphabet; dictionaries sort them together with a and e. As in German, every noun starts with a capital letter: d’Haus (the house), de Mann, d’Kanner (the children).
The spelling is official. A law of 1984 made Luxembourgish the national language of Luxembourg, and the state sets its orthography, most recently revised in 2019. The Zenter fir d’Lëtzebuerger Sprooch looks after the rules, and the Lëtzebuerger Online Dictionnaire (LOD) is an official spelling reference.
Borrowed words keep the accents of the language they come from, so French loanwords bring along è, à or ç and German ones ö or ü. Those letters belong to individual words rather than to the Luxembourgish alphabet, and you will find them in the French and German collections.
What ä, é and ë sound like
ë is the most typically Luxembourgish letter. It stands for a short, dull vowel under stress, roughly like the unstressed vowel in English about: Lëtzebuerg, fënnef (five), Mëttwoch (Wednesday), wëllen (to want). The same dull sound is common in unstressed syllables too, as in the -en endings, where plain e is written; ë is the usual spelling in stressed syllables.
é is a closed e, the sound of French é. It often opens the vowel pair éi, a frequent one in the language: schéin (beautiful), Wéi geet et? (How are you?), Méindeg (Monday), Léiw (lion), as in de Roude Léiw , the red lion of the national coat of arms.
ä is an open vowel, close to the a in English cat: Äppel (apples), Äddi (goodbye). It also starts the vowel pair äi, as in Wäin (wine). Leaving the accents off is a spelling mistake, and readers will stumble: Letzebuerg without its ë is how a foreigner writes it.
The n-rule: why words drop their final n
Luxembourgish spelling shows a sound rule that surprises learners: a final -n is dropped when the next word begins with a consonant, except n, d, t, z and h, and it stays before a vowel and before those five letters. So the article is de Mann but den Hond (the dog) and den Apel; you say Gudde Moien (good morning) but Gudden Owend (good evening) and Gudden Appetit.
The national motto shows the rule twice: Mir wëlle bleiwe wat mir sinn, “We want to remain what we are”. The full forms are wëllen and bleiwen, and each loses its n before the b and the w that follow.
The apostrophe is the other mark you see everywhere. The feminine, neuter and plural article d’ is joined to its noun: d’Lëtzebuerger Sprooch (the Luxembourgish language), d’Kanner. The curly ’ is the typographic form; the straight ' from a plain keyboard is just as common online.
How to type Luxembourgish letters ä, é and ë
Keyboards sold in Luxembourg use the Swiss French QWERTZ layout, which Windows and macOS both offer. On it é has its own key, Shift with the à key gives ä, and the dead key followed by e gives ë (followed by ShiftE, Ë).
On a US keyboard in Windows, switch to the US-International layout: ' then e gives é, " then e gives ë, " then a gives ä, with Shift for the capitals, and AltGr5 gives . Without it, hold Alt and type on the number pad: 0228 ä, 0196 Ä, 0233 é, 0201 É, 0235 ë, 0203 Ë, 0132 „, 0147 “, 0146 ’ and 0128 .
On a Mac, Option+U then the letter gives ë, ä, Ë or Ä; Option+E then e gives é; Option+Shift+W gives „, Option+[ gives “, Option+Shift+] gives ’ and Option+Shift+2 gives . On an iPhone or Android phone, hold the e key to pick é or ë and the a key for ä; adding a German or French keyboard in the settings gives the same long-press choices and spelling suggestions in that language.
In HTML the letters are ä, é and ë (capitals Ä, É, Ë), the quotes „ and “, and the euro €. All six letters are in the Latin-1 range of Unicode (U00C4 Ä, U00C9 É, U00CB Ë, U00E4 ä, U00E9 é, U00EB ë), so they are widely supported.
Quotation marks and the euro sign
Luxembourgish quotes the German way: a low mark to open and a high one to close, „Moien!“, with the single pair ‚…‘ for a quote inside a quote. Note that the closing mark “ is the one English uses to open. The French guillemets « » belong to French texts, which share the page with Luxembourgish in much of Luxembourg’s public life.
Luxembourg pays in euros . The euro replaced the Luxembourg franc in 2002, and prices are written with a decimal comma, as in 12,50 .
Where Luxembourgish is spoken
CLDR estimates about 450,000 speakers of Luxembourgish, nearly all of them in Luxembourg , where it is the national language and the everyday spoken language of Luxembourgers, while French and German share the work of law, schooling and the press. Closely related Moselle Franconian dialects are spoken across the borders, around Arlon in Belgium, in Lorraine in France and in the German Eifel and Moselle valley.
Many people living in Luxembourg came from abroad and learn Luxembourgish as a second language; applicants for naturalisation generally must pass a Luxembourgish language test, the Sproochentest. Its closest relatives are German and Swiss German, and Dutch is a cousin; see the German, Swiss German, Dutch and French letter collections, and the Luxembourg emoji collection for the flag, the Red Lion and the rest of the country.
How to use them
5 situationsClick to copyLuxembourgish Alphabet & Letters combos
13Worth knowing
- Luxembourgish became the national language of Luxembourg only in 1984, by a law that also set the roles of French and German.
- Luxembourgish is not an official language of the European Union, although Luxembourg is a founding member and hosts the EU’s Court of Justice.
- The national motto, Mir wëlle bleiwe wat mir sinn, drops a final n twice under the n-rule: wëllen and bleiwen lose it before b and w.
- Luxembourgish needs no special Unicode: ä, é and ë were all in the Latin-1 character set of the 1980s, so they are widely supported.
Questions people ask
7How many letters are in the Luxembourgish alphabet?
26, the same A to Z as English. Luxembourgish also writes ä, é and ë (Ä, É, Ë), which are sorted together with a and e rather than counted as extra letters.
How to type ë on a laptop?
On Windows, hold Alt and type 0235 on the number pad (0203 for Ë), or switch to US-International and press " then e. On a Swiss French keyboard press the key, then e. On a Mac press OptionU, then e.
What is the Luxembourgish keyboard layout?
Luxembourg uses the Swiss French QWERTZ layout. It has keys for é, è and à, gives ä with Shift on the à key, and makes ë with the dead key followed by e.
How do you pronounce ë in Luxembourgish?
As a short, dull, stressed vowel, roughly like the u in English but: Lëtzebuerg, fënnef (five). é is a closed e as in French, and ä is an open vowel close to the a in cat.
How to say hello in Luxembourgish?
Moien. It works at any time of day; Gudde Moien is good morning and Gudden Owend good evening.
How to say goodbye in Luxembourgish?
Äddi, with the capital Ä at the start. Gutt Nuecht is good night.
Is Luxembourgish German?
No. It is a West Germanic language that grew from the Moselle Franconian dialects, close to German but with its own spelling, words and grammar, and it has been Luxembourg’s national language by law since 1984.
