---
title: "Which Finnish consonants are borrowed?"
description: "B, g, f and š came into Finnish with borrowed words and never fully settled in. The standard grammar says so, and the dictionary headword counts show how thinly."
type: "article"
category: "listening"
url: "https://finnishirl.com/blog/sounds-finnish-does-not-have"
canonical: "https://finnishirl.com/blog/sounds-finnish-does-not-have"
published: "2026-10-16"
updated: "2026-10-16"
author: "Andrey the Nomad"
site: "Finnish IRL"
license: "https://finnishirl.com/terms#ip"
---

# Which Finnish consonants are borrowed?
URL: https://finnishirl.com/blog/sounds-finnish-does-not-have
Date: 2026-10-16
Updated: 2026-10-16
Category: listening
Keywords: finnish pronunciation mistakes, finnish consonants, why do finns say p instead of b, finnish loanwords sounds, finnish phonology for learners, finnish accent english
Summary: B, g, f and š came into Finnish with borrowed words and never fully settled in. The standard grammar says so, and the dictionary headword counts show how thinly.

Quick answer:
- Iso suomen kielioppi states it directly: f, š, b and g entered the standard language with loanwords, they occur mainly in foreign and slang words, and their position in the sound system is less stable than that of the other sounds.
- The dictionary puts a number on it. Perussanakirja has roughly 1,400 headwords containing f, 1,300 containing b and 1,600 containing g, against about twenty thousand each for v and p.
- Š is the rarest sound in the language, with about sixty headwords, and its voiced partner ž survives in a handful of words such as džonkki.
- The same history explains the word shapes. A native Finnish word does not begin with a consonant cluster, so old loans lost theirs, and the newer a loan is the less it has been adapted.

What you'll learn:
- Which Finnish consonants are native and which arrived with borrowing
- The headword counts that show how marginal the borrowed ones still are
- Why the oldest loanwords look Finnish and the newest ones do not
- What all of this predicts about your own accent, in both directions

Body:

Open Perussanakirja and count the headwords containing each letter. Iso suomen kielioppi did, and printed the result: about **1,400** words with an <span lang="fi">f</span>, about **1,300** with a <span lang="fi">b</span>, about **1,600** with a <span lang="fi">g</span>, and about **60** spelled with <span lang="fi">š</span>.

Then the comparison that makes those numbers mean something. Headwords containing <span lang="fi">v</span>, or containing <span lang="fi">p</span>: **about twenty thousand each**.[^visk6]

![The shopfront of a computer shop on Pursimiehenkatu in Helsinki](/images/words/optimized/blog-sounds-finnish-does-not-have-1-a594859401-1080.webp "Bitmaster, tietokone, kauppa. Only the shop's own name carries a borrowed consonant")

## The grammar says it in as many words

This is not an inference from the counts. It is the standard grammar's own opening sentence on the subject: the sounds <span lang="fi">f</span>, <span lang="fi">š</span>, <span lang="fi">b</span> and <span lang="fi">g</span> **came into the standard language with loanwords**, they occur mainly in foreign and slang words, and "their position in the sound system is not as stable as that of the other sounds".[^visk6]

<span lang="fi">Š</span> is described there as the rarest sound in Finnish. It is often written <span lang="fi">sh</span> or <span lang="fi">ch</span> instead, which is why <span lang="fi">shampoo</span> and <span lang="fi">sampoo</span> are both in circulation.[^ks] Its voiced partner <span lang="fi">ž</span> is more marginal still, surviving in perhaps a handful of words: <span lang="fi">džonkki</span>, <span lang="fi">maharadža</span>.

<span lang="fi">D</span> belongs with them in foreign and slang vocabulary, which is worth holding onto, because it is also the consonant whose realisation varies most across the country.

| Sound {fi} | Headwords in Perussanakirja | Turns up in |
| --- | --- | --- |
| p | about 20,000 | everything |
| v | about 20,000 | everything |
| g | about 1,600 | gaala, jogurtti, glögi, diggaa |
| f | about 1,400 | farkut, katastrofi, futis, safka |
| b | about 1,300 | banaani, bussi, biisi, bailaa |
| š | about 60 | šakki, shampoo, tšekki |

The slang column is not decoration. [Helsinki slang](/words/stadi) is full of these sounds because it is full of Swedish, and the words that carry them - [duuni](/words/duuni), <span lang="fi">safka</span>, <span lang="fi">biisi</span> - never went through the adaptation the older loans did.

<div id="midpost-newsletter-slot"></div>

## What it predicts about your accent

The interesting part is that the rule runs in both directions, and most learners have only noticed one of them.

**Into Finnish.** Your <span lang="fi">b</span> and <span lang="fi">g</span> are probably crisper than the room's, which costs nothing and is never commented on. What does get noticed is length, and [that is a different problem with a different fix](/blog/finnish-pronunciation-length).

**Out of Finnish.** A Finnish accent in English is partly this same sound system running backwards: a borrowed sound is pulled toward its nearest native neighbour, so <span lang="fi">th</span> arrives as t or s, <span lang="fi">w</span> as v, <span lang="fi">z</span> as s, and p, t and k come without the puff of air an English ear is listening for. The clusters are not the problem any more. That happened to the loanwords, not to the speakers.

<div class="callout callout--sea">
  <div class="callout-head"><span class="callout-title">The honest ranking</span></div>
  <p>This is not where pronunciation effort goes. <b>Vowel and consonant length change the word; a slightly foreign b does not.</b> Kielibuusti's own phonetics guide for learners leads with length and with one-letter-one-sound, and does not spend a slide on the borrowed consonants.</p>
  <p>Know this instead because it is an explanation rather than a drill. It tells you why the vocabulary looks the way it does, and that is worth more per minute than any amount of repeating <span lang="fi">banaani</span>.</p>
</div>

## Why old loans look Finnish and new ones do not

Two rules, both from the grammar, and together they explain a whole class of word shapes.[^visk11][^visk150][^kielibuusti]

<ol class="ladder">
  <li class="step">
    <div class="step-n">1</div>
    <div class="step-body">
      <div class="step-title">A native syllable is CV or CVC</div>
      <div class="step-note">Finnish syllables are typically a consonant plus a vowel, or a consonant, a vowel and a consonant. Other syllable types "occur in foreign and slang words", where a cluster like <span lang="fi">str</span>, <span lang="fi">spr</span>, <span lang="fi">skr</span> or <span lang="fi">kl</span> can open a word or a later syllable. Native Finnish word shapes do not do that.</div>
    </div>
  </li>
  <li class="step">
    <div class="step-n">2</div>
    <div class="step-body">
      <div class="step-title">The older the loan, the more adapted it is</div>
      <div class="step-note">Borrowed words "have generally been adapted to Finnish phoneme and word structure", and the grammar states the consequence plainly: <b>the age of a loan shows in its shape, and the older it is, the more adapted</b>. Three-syllable and longer loans are on average younger and closer to their source word than two-syllable ones.</div>
    </div>
  </li>
</ol>

Put those together and a word's shape becomes a rough date stamp. A short, cluster-free, b-free, g-free word has usually been in the language long enough to have been filed down. A word that opens with <span lang="fi">tr</span> or carries a <span lang="fi">g</span> in the middle arrived recently enough to keep them.

The grammar adds the part that is easy to miss: the loans have not only been changed by Finnish, **they have changed Finnish**. Syllable types and consonant phonemes that the language did not formerly have are in it now because borrowed words brought them.[^visk150]

![The interior of the Kulosaari shopping centre in Helsinki](/images/words/optimized/blog-sounds-finnish-does-not-have-2-7c2371059f-1080.webp "Shop and product names are where the newest and least adapted loans live")

The borrowed layer came mostly from one place: a study applying the Loanword Typology core-meaning list to Finnish found that [69 per cent of the borrowed meanings in its sample came from Swedish or its earlier Germanic stages](/blog/is-finnish-related-to-hungarian).[^cronhamn] The sounds arrived with the words, over a very long time and from a very small number of directions.

![A bilingual street sign in Helsinki reading Uudenmaankatu and Nylandsgatan](/images/words/optimized/blog-sounds-finnish-does-not-have-3-9e4bd011cd-1080.webp "The two languages on this sign have been trading consonants for about a thousand years")

There is a useful counter-example on any Finnish shoreline. <span lang="fi">Äkkisyvää</span>, the warning sign meaning sudden deep water, is four consonants and five vowels, and not one of the consonants is borrowed.

![A Finnish warning sign by the water reading Äkkisyvää](/images/words/optimized/blog-sounds-finnish-does-not-have-4-5d3e4209dc-1080.webp "Äkkisyvää, sudden deep water. Every consonant in it is native")

So the practical test, if you want one: a Finnish word with a <span lang="fi">b</span>, a <span lang="fi">g</span>, an <span lang="fi">f</span> or a cluster at the front is a word that came from somewhere else, and recently enough that nobody filed it down. That is several thousand words you can date at a glance.

[^visk6]: [VISK § 6 Äänteet f, š, b ja g: bluffata, tšekki, jogurtti](https://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=6) - Iso suomen kielioppi. Source of the statement that these sounds entered with loanwords, that š is the rarest sound in Finnish, and of the Perussanakirja headword counts

[^visk11]: [VISK § 11 Tavu kielen rakenneyksikkönä ja suomen tavutyyppejä](https://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=11) - Iso suomen kielioppi, on Finnish syllable types and the cluster-initial syllables found in foreign and slang words

[^visk150]: [VISK § 150 Lainasanakerrostumat ja lainojen mukautuminen](https://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=150) - Iso suomen kielioppi, on the layers of loans, their adaptation, and the effect they have had on Finnish phonotactics

[^ks]: [Kielitoimiston sanakirja: šakki](https://www.kielitoimistonsanakirja.fi/#/%C5%A1akki) - Institute for the Languages of Finland

[^kielibuusti]: [Phonetics for Finnish learners](https://www.kielibuusti.fi/sites/default/files/2025-03/Phonetics%20for%20Finnish%20learners.pdf) - Kielibuusti, University of Helsinki

[^cronhamn]: [Quantifying loanwords: a study of borrowability in the Finnish lexicon](https://lucris.lub.lu.se/ws/portalfiles/portal/118581152/220419_Emprunts_lexicaux_Finnois_Aix_Marseille_.pdf) - Sandra Cronhamn, Lund University

FAQ:
Q: Do Finns really not distinguish b and p?
A: Almost everyone does. Bussi and pussi are different words, and mixing them up reads as a joke rather than as an accent. What is true is that a Finnish b is lighter than an English one, barely voiced and never aspirated, and that the merger you have read about belongs to older and more rural speech than anything you will hear in a Helsinki office.

Q: Why is it pankki and not banki?
A: Because it arrived before b was part of the standard language, so it came in as p. Kotus traces it from Italian banca, a money-changer's bench, through German and Swedish, and notes it shares a Germanic root with Finnish penkki. The same substitution gave piispa from biskop.

Q: Is š actually used?
A: Rarely, and it is often written sh or ch instead, which is why you see both shampoo and sampoo. Iso suomen kielioppi calls it the rarest sound in Finnish.

Q: What about d?
A: D sits in the same borrowed group in foreign and slang words, and it is also the sound whose pronunciation varies most around the country. It is the single most useful dialect variable there is.

Q: Does this matter for my pronunciation?
A: Less than length does. Getting a b slightly wrong costs you nothing; getting a vowel length wrong changes the word.

Q: Why did the old loanwords lose their consonant clusters?
A: Because a native word shape does not start with one. Strand became ranta, glas became lasi, krist became risti. It is a rule about how words entered the language centuries ago, not a description of how anybody speaks now.

Q: Are these sounds increasing?
A: The borrowed layer of the vocabulary is growing and the newest loans are the least adapted, so in practice yes. The grammar describes their status as unsettled rather than as fixed.

Q: Is any of this worth studying?
A: Not as a drill. It is worth knowing because it explains a whole class of word shapes at once, which is cheaper than meeting them one at a time.

Sources:
- VISK § 6 Äänteet f, š, b ja g: bluffata, tšekki, jogurtti: https://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=6
- VISK § 11 Tavu kielen rakenneyksikkönä ja suomen tavutyyppejä: https://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=11
- VISK § 150 Lainasanakerrostumat ja lainojen mukautuminen: https://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=150
- Phonetics for Finnish learners: https://www.kielibuusti.fi/sites/default/files/2025-03/Phonetics%20for%20Finnish%20learners.pdf
- Quantifying loanwords: a study of borrowability in the Finnish lexicon: https://lucris.lub.lu.se/ws/portalfiles/portal/118581152/220419_Emprunts_lexicaux_Finnois_Aix_Marseille_.pdf
- Kielitoimiston sanakirja: šakki: https://www.kielitoimistonsanakirja.fi/#/%C5%A1akki

Related words: stadi, duuni, ratikka, punanen