What is a consonant in simple words?

A consonant is a sound made when your mouth, tongue, teeth, or lips block the air in some way, and in English it is usually written with any letter that is not a, e, i, o, or u. Examples are b, c, d, f, g, and h.

What is a consonant vs a vowel?

A consonant is a sound made with some blockage of air in the mouth, like /b/ or /t/. A vowel is a sound made with an open mouth and flowing air, like /a/ or /o/. In writing, consonants are usually all letters except a, e, i, o, and u, which are vowels.

How many consonants are there in the English alphabet?

The English alphabet has 26 letters. Five of them are usually vowels (a, e, i, o, u), so the remaining 21 letters are consonants. The letter y can act as a consonant or a vowel, depending on the word.

Why are consonants important for reading and spelling?

Consonants give words much of their shape and structure. When children learn which letters are consonants and what sounds they make, they can blend those sounds with vowels to read new words and break words apart to spell them more accurately.

What Is a Consonant? Definition and Examples

Consonants explained for kids

Consonants are letters that make a sound when your mouth, tongue, teeth, or lips block the air a little. The letters b, c, d, f, g, and h are all consonants. In the word "cat," the sounds /c/ and /t/ are consonants, and /a/ is a vowel. Every word in English has at least one consonant or one vowel, and many words have both!

Worked examples with consonants

Example 1 (younger learners): Finding consonants in a simple word

Look at the word "dog." Say each sound slowly: /d/ /o/ /g/.

/d/ is made by putting your tongue on the top of your mouth and then letting the air pop out. That is a consonant sound, written with the consonant letter d.
/o/ is an open mouth sound. That is a vowel sound, written with the vowel letter o.
/g/ is made by stopping the air in the back of your mouth, then letting it go. That is a consonant sound, written with the consonant letter g.

So in "dog," d and g are consonants, and o is a vowel.

Example 2 (older learners): Consonant patterns in a longer word

Look at the word "stamp." Say it slowly: /s/ /t/ /a/ /m/ /p/.

The letters s and t at the beginning are both consonants. Together they make the blend /st/ where you hear both consonant sounds.
The letter a is a vowel. It makes the short /a/ sound.
The letters m and p at the end are consonants. You can hear /m/ and /p/ as two separate consonant sounds.

This word has 4 consonant letters (s, t, m, p) and 1 vowel letter (a). Knowing which letters are consonants helps your child sound out and spell words like "stamp," "stand," and "stop."

Going deeper with consonants

As your child moves through elementary grades, consonants show up in more complex patterns. Two consonants can work together to make a new sound, such as sh in "ship" or ch in "chip." This is called a digraph, where two letters stand for one sound.

Other times, two or three consonants sit together and you can still hear each sound, like cl in "clap" or str in "street." These are consonant blends. Recognizing common consonant patterns helps with decoding (sounding out) longer words and with spelling them correctly.

Consonants also connect to ideas like phoneme (the smallest sound in a word) and phonemic awareness (hearing and working with those sounds). A consonant sound is one type of phoneme your child learns to notice and use when reading and writing.

Common mistakes with consonants

Mistake: Thinking y is always a consonant, just like in "yes."
Correction: Y is usually a consonant at the start of a word or syllable ("yes," "yellow"), but it can act like a vowel at the end of words ("my," "happy").
Mistake: Believing that every consonant letter must make its sound in every word. For example, saying the k in "knight."
Correction: Some consonant letters are silent in certain words, like k in "knight" or b in "lamb," so the letter is there, but you do not hear a consonant sound.
Mistake: Mixing up consonants and vowels and calling any "hard" or "loud" sound a consonant.
Correction: Consonants are sounds made with some blockage of air in the mouth, and in English they are usually written with letters other than a, e, i, o, and u, while vowels are open-mouth sounds written with those vowel letters.

How consonants show up in everyday life

Consonants are in almost every word your child says and reads, from names on a class list to labels on food packages. When your child sounds out a word on a game screen or a sign at the park, they are using consonant sounds and letters to figure out what it says.

Related terms to explore

Explore reading and language arts on Learning Hub

Create a free account to explore free K-12 reading and language arts practice with your child on Learning Hub.

What is a consonant?