View source for Vowel length

{{Short description|Duration of a vowel sound}}
{{More citations needed|date=September 2015}}
{{Use American English|date=October 2022}}
{{Infobox IPA
| above      = Long
| ipa symbol = ◌ː
| ipa number = 503
| decimal1   = 720
}}
{{Infobox IPA
| above      = Half-long
| ipa symbol = ◌ˑ
| ipa number = 504
| decimal1   = 721
}}
{{Infobox IPA
| above      = [[Extra-short]]
| ipa symbol = ◌&#x0306;
| ipa number = 505
| decimal1   = 774
| unicode    = U+0306
}}
In [[linguistics]], '''vowel length''' is the perceived or actual [[length (phonetics)|duration]] of a [[vowel]] sound when pronounced. Vowels perceived as shorter are often called '''short vowels''' and those perceived as longer called '''long vowels'''.

On one hand, many languages do not distinguish vowel length [[phoneme|phonemically]], meaning that vowel length alone does not change the meanings of words. However, the amount of time a vowel is uttered can change based on factors such as the phonetic characteristics of the sounds around it: the [[phonetic environment]]. An example is that vowels tend to be pronounced longer before a [[voiced consonant]] and shorter before a [[voiceless consonant]] in the standard accents of [[General American English|American]] and [[Received Pronunciation|British English]].

On the other hand, vowel length is indeed an important [[phonemic]] factor in certain languages, meaning vowel length can change word-meanings, for example in [[Arabic phonology#Vowels|Arabic]], [[Czech phonology|Czech]], [[Dravidian languages]] (such as [[Tamil language|Tamil]]), some [[Finno-Ugric languages]] (such as [[Finnish phonology#Length|Finnish]] and [[Estonian phonology|Estonian]]), [[Japanese phonology#Vowels|Japanese]], [[Kyrgyz phonology|Kyrgyz]], [[Samoan language#Phonology|Samoan]], and [[Xhosa language#Vowels|Xhosa]]. Some languages in the past likely had the distinction even though their modern descendants do not, with an example being [[Latin phonology#Vowels|Latin]] versus its descendent [[Romance languages]] like Spanish and French. Length also plays a lesser phonetic role in [[Cantonese]], unlike in other [[varieties of Chinese]], which do not have phonemic vowel length distinctions.

Whether vowel length alone changes word-meanings in [[English language|English]] depends on the particular dialect; it is able to do so in a few [[non-rhotic]] dialects, such as [[Australian English]], [[Lunenburg English]], [[New Zealand English]], [[South African English]], and possibly some ([[vernacular]]) [[English language in Southern England|English of Southern England]]. For instance, vowel length can distinguish ''park'' {{IPA|/paːk/}} from ''puck'' {{IPA|/pak/}} in Australian and New Zealand English, or ''bared'' {{IPA|/beːd/}} from ''bed'' {{IPA|/bed/}} in any of these dialects. Phonemic vowel length perhaps marginally occurs in a few rhotic dialects too, such as [[Scottish English]] and [[Northern Irish English]] (see [[Scottish vowel length rule]]).

Languages that do distinguish vowel length phonemically usually only distinguish between short vowels and long vowels. Very few languages distinguish three phonemic vowel lengths; some that do so are [[Estonian language|Estonian]], [[Luiseño language|Luiseño]], and [[Mixe language|Mixe]]. However, languages with two vowel lengths may permit words in which two adjacent vowels are of the same quality: Japanese {{lang|ja|ほうおう}}, {{transliteration|ja|[[hōō]]}}, "phoenix", or [[Ancient Greek]] {{lang|grc-x-ionic|ἀάατος}} {{IPA|[a.áː.a.tos]}},<ref>Liddell, H. G., and R. Scott (1996). ''A Greek-English Lexicon'' (revised 9th ed. with supplement). Oxford: Oxford University Press. p.1</ref> "inviolable". Some languages that do not ordinarily have phonemic vowel length but permit vowel [[Hiatus (linguistics)|hiatus]] may similarly exhibit sequences of identical vowel phonemes that yield ''phonetically'' long vowels, such as [[Georgian language|Georgian]] {{lang|ka|გააადვილებ}}, {{transliteration|ka|gaaadvileb}} {{IPA|ka|ɡa.a.ad.vil.eb|}}, "you will facilitate it".

==Related features==
[[Stress (linguistics)|Stress]] is often reinforced by allophonic vowel length, especially when it is lexical. For example, [[French language|French]] long vowels are always in stressed syllables. [[Finnish language|Finnish]], a language with two phonemic lengths, indicates the stress by adding allophonic length, which gives four distinctive lengths and five physical lengths: short and long stressed vowels, short and long unstressed vowels, and a half-long vowel, which is a short vowel found in a syllable immediately preceded by a stressed short vowel: ''i-s'''o'''''.

Among the languages with distinctive vowel length, there are some in which it may occur only in stressed syllables, such as in [[Alemannic German]], [[Scottish Gaelic]] and [[Egyptian Arabic]]. In languages such as [[Czech language|Czech]], [[Finnish language|Finnish]], some Irish dialects and [[Classical Latin]], vowel length is distinctive also in unstressed syllables.

In some languages, vowel length is sometimes better analyzed as a sequence of two identical vowels. In [[Finnic languages]], such as Finnish, the simplest example follows from [[consonant gradation]]: ''haka → haan''. In some cases, it is caused by a following [[chroneme]], which is etymologically a consonant: ''jää'' "ice" ← [[Proto-Uralic]] *''jäŋe''. In non-initial syllables, it is ambiguous if long vowels are vowel clusters; poems written in the [[Kalevala meter]] often syllabicate between the vowels, and an (etymologically original) intervocalic ''-h-'' is seen in that and some modern dialects (''taivaan'' vs. ''taivahan'' "of the sky"). Morphological treatment of [[diphthong]]s is essentially similar to long vowels. Some old Finnish long vowels have developed into diphthongs, but successive layers of borrowing have introduced the same long vowels again so the diphthong and the long vowel now again contrast (''nuotti'' "musical note" vs. ''nootti'' "diplomatic note").

In Japanese, most long vowels are the results of the phonetic change of [[diphthong]]s; ''au'' and ''ou'' became ''ō'', ''iu'' became ''yū'', ''eu'' became ''yō'', and now ''ei'' is becoming ''ē''. The change also occurred after the loss of intervocalic phoneme {{IPA|/h/}}. For example, modern ''Kyōto'' ([[Kyoto]]) has undergone a shift: {{IPA|/kjauto/ → /kjoːto/}}. Another example is ''shōnen'' (''boy''): {{IPA|/seuneɴ/ → /sjoːneɴ/ [ɕoːneɴ]}}.

==Phonemic vowel length==
As noted above, only a relatively few of the world's languages make a [[phonemic]] distinction between long and short vowels. Some families have many such languages, examples being the [[Dravidian languages]] and the [[Finno-Ugric languages]]. Other languages have fewer relatives with vowel length, including [[Arabic]], [[Japanese language|Japanese]], [[Scottish Gaelic]]. There are also older languages such as [[Ancient Greek]], [[Biblical Hebrew]], and [[Latin]] which have phonemic vowel length but no descendants that preserve it.

In Latin and Hungarian, some long vowels are analyzed as separate phonemes from short vowels:
{|
| width="50%" valign="top" |

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
|+ Latin vowels
! rowspan="2" | &nbsp;
! colspan="2" | [[Front vowel|Front]]
! colspan="2" | [[Central vowel|Central]]
! colspan="2" | [[Back vowel|Back]]
|-
! short !! long
! short !! long
! short !! long
|-
! [[Close vowel|High]]
| {{IPA|/ɪ/}} || {{IPA|/iː/}}
| colspan="2" | &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/ʊ/}} || {{IPA|/uː/}}
|-
! [[Mid vowel|Mid]]
| {{IPA|/ɛ/}} || {{IPA|/eː/}}
| colspan="2"|&nbsp;
| {{IPA|/ɔ/}} || {{IPA|/oː/}}
|-
! [[Open vowel|Low]]
| colspan="2" | &nbsp;
| {{IPA|/a/}} || {{IPA|/aː/}}
| colspan="2" | &nbsp;
|}

| width="50%" valign="top" |

{| class="wikitable" style=text-align:center
|+ Hungarian vowels
|- 
! rowspan="3" | 
! colspan="4" | [[Front vowel|Front]]
! colspan="1" rowspan="2" | [[Central vowel|Central]]
! colspan="2" rowspan="2" | [[Back vowel|Back]]
|- 
! colspan="2" | unrounded
! colspan="2" | rounded
|- 
! <small>short</small>
! <small>long</small>
! <small>short</small>
! <small>long</small>
! <small>long</small>
! <small>short</small>
! <small>long</small>
|-
! [[Close vowel|High]]
| {{IPA|/i/}}
| {{IPA|/iː/}}
| {{IPA|/y/}}
| {{IPA|/yː/}}
|
| {{IPA|/u/}}
| {{IPA|/uː/}}
|- 
! [[Mid vowel|Mid]]
| {{IPA|/ɛ/}}
| {{IPA|/eː/}}
| {{IPA|/ø/}}
| {{IPA|/øː/}}
|
| {{IPA|/o/}}
| {{IPA|/oː/}}
|- 
! [[Open vowel|Low]]
| colspan="4" |
| {{IPA|/aː/}}
| {{IPA|/ɒ/}}
|
|}
|}

Vowel length contrasts with more than two phonemic levels are rare, and several hypothesized cases of three-level vowel length can be analysed without postulating this typologically unusual configuration.<ref>Odden, David (2011). The Representation of Vowel Length. In Marc van Oostendorp, Colin J. Ewen, Elizabeth Hume, & Keren Rice (eds.) The Blackwell Companion to Phonology. Wiley-Blackwell, 465–490.</ref> [[Estonian language|Estonian]] has three distinctive lengths, but the third is [[suprasegmental]], as it has developed from the allophonic variation caused by now-deleted grammatical markers. For example, half-long 'aa' in ''saada'' comes from the agglutination *''saa+tta+k */sɑːtˑɑk/'' "send (saatta-) +(imperative)", and the overlong 'aa' in ''saada'' comes from *''saa+dak'' "get+(infinitive)". As for languages that have three lengths, independent of vowel quality or syllable structure, these include [[Dinka language|Dinka]], [[Mixe language|Mixe]], [[Yavapai language|Yavapai]] and [[Wichita language|Wichita]]. An example from Mixe is {{IPA|[poʃ]}} "guava", {{IPA|[poˑʃ]}} "spider", {{IPA|[poːʃ]}} "knot". In Dinka the longest vowels are three [[mora (linguistics)|moras]] long, and so are best analyzed as overlong e.g. {{IPA|/oːː/}}.

Four-way distinctions have been claimed, but these are actually long-short distinctions on adjacent syllables.{{Citation needed|date=May 2011}} For example, in [[Kikamba]], there is {{IPA|[ko.ko.na]}}, {{IPA|[kóó.ma̋]}}, {{IPA|[ko.óma̋]}}, {{IPA|[nétónubáné.éetɛ̂]}} "hit", "dry", "bite", "we have chosen for everyone and are still choosing".

==By language==
===In English===
{{tone|section|date=October 2018}}

====Contrastive vowel length====
In many varieties of English, vowels contrast with each other both in length and in quality, and descriptions differ in the relative importance given to these two features. Some descriptions of [[Received Pronunciation]] and more widely some descriptions of [[English phonology]] group all non-diphthongal vowels into the categories "long" and "short", convenient terms for grouping the many vowels of English.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wells |first1=John C |title=Accents of English |date=1982 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |page=119}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=Daniel |last2=Roach |first2=Peter |last3=Setter |first3=Jane |last4=Esling |first4=John |title=The Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary |date=2011 |publisher=Cambridge |isbn=978-0-521-15255-6 |page=vii | edition = 18th}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Wells |first1=J.C. |title=Longman Pronunciation Dictionary |date=2008 |publisher=Longman |page=xxiii |edition=3rd}}</ref> [[Daniel Jones (phonetician)|Daniel Jones]] proposed that phonetically similar pairs of long and short vowels could be grouped into single phonemes, distinguished by the presence or absence of phonological length ([[chroneme]]).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=Daniel |title=An Outline of English Phonetics |date=1967 |publisher=Heffer |page=63 |edition=9th}}</ref> The usual long-short pairings for RP are /iː + ɪ/, /ɑː + æ/, /ɜ: + ə/, /ɔː + ɒ/, /u + ʊ/, but Jones omits /ɑː + æ/. This approach is not found in present-day descriptions of English. Vowels show allophonic variation in length and also in other features according to the context in which they occur. The terms ''tense'' (corresponding to ''long'') and ''lax'' (corresponding to ''short'') are alternative terms that do not directly refer to length.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Giegerich |first1=H. |title=English phonology: an introduction |date=1992 |publisher=Cambridge |page=para 3.3}}</ref>

In [[Australian English phonology|Australian English]], there is contrastive vowel length in closed syllables between long and short {{IPA|/e/}} and {{IPA|/ɐ/}}. The following are [[minimal pair]]s of length:

{| style="margin-left: 1em;" cellspacing="3"
| {{IPA|/ˈfeɹiː/}} ''ferry'' |||| {{IPA|/ˈfeːɹiː/}} ''fairy''
|-
| {{IPA|/ˈkɐt/}} ''cut'' |||| {{IPA|/ˈkɐːt/}} ''cart''
|}

====Allophonic vowel length====
In most varieties of English, for instance [[Received Pronunciation]] and [[General American]], there is [[allophonic]] variation in vowel length depending on the value of the consonant that follows it: vowels are shorter before voiceless consonants and are longer when they come before voiced consonants.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Kluender|first1=Keith|last2=Diehl|first2=Randy|last3=Wright|first3=Beverly|title= Vowel-length Differences Before Voiced and Voiceless Consonants: An Auditory Explanation|date=1988|publisher=Journal of Phonetics|page=153}}</ref> Thus, the vowel in ''bad'' {{IPA|/bæd/}} is longer than the vowel in ''bat'' {{IPA|/bæt/}}. Also compare ''neat'' {{IPAc-en|n|iː|t}} with ''need'' {{IPAc-en|n|iː|d}}. The vowel sound in "beat" is generally pronounced for about 190 milliseconds, but the same vowel in "bead" lasts 350 milliseconds in normal speech, the voiced final consonant influencing vowel length.

[[Cockney English]] features short and long varieties of the closing diphthong {{IPA|[ɔʊ]}}. The short {{IPA|[ɔʊ]}} corresponds to RP {{IPA|/ɔː/}} in morphologically closed syllables (see [[thought split]]), whereas the long {{IPA|[ɔʊː]}} corresponds to the non-prevocalic sequence {{IPA|/ɔːl/}} (see [[l-vocalization]]). The following are minimal pairs of length:

{| style="margin-left: 1em;" cellspacing="3"
|-
| {{IPA|[ˈfɔʊʔ]}} ''fort/fought'' || || {{IPA|[ˈfɔʊːʔ]}} ''fault''
|-
| {{IPA|[ˈpɔʊz]}} ''pause'' || || {{IPA|[ˈpɔʊːz]}} ''Paul's''
|-
| {{IPA|[ˈwɔʊʔə]}} ''water'' || || {{IPA|[ˈwɔʊːʔə]}} ''Walter''
|}

The difference is lost in running speech, so that ''fault'' falls together with ''fort'' and ''fought'' as {{IPA|[ˈfɔʊʔ]}} or {{IPA|[ˈfoːʔ]}}. The contrast between the two diphthongs is phonetic rather than phonemic, as the {{IPA|/l/}} can be restored in formal speech: {{IPA|[ˈfoːɫt]}} etc., which suggests that the underlying form of {{IPA|[ˈfɔʊːʔ]}} is {{IPA|/ˈfoːlt/}} (John Wells says that the vowel is equally correctly transcribed with {{angbr IPA|ɔʊ}} or {{angbr IPA|oʊ}}, not to be confused with {{sc2|GOAT}} {{IPA|/ʌʊ/, [ɐɤ]}}). Furthermore, a vocalized word-final {{IPA|/l/}} is often restored before a word-initial vowel, so that ''fall out'' {{IPA|[fɔʊl ˈæəʔ]}} (cf. ''thaw out'' {{IPA|[fɔəɹ ˈæəʔ]}}, with an [[intrusive r|intrusive {{IPA|/r/|cat=no}}]]) is somewhat more likely to contain the lateral {{IPAblink|l}} than ''fall'' {{IPA|[fɔʊː]}}. The distinction between {{IPA|[ɔʊ]}} and {{IPA|[ɔʊː]}} exists only word-internally before consonants other than intervocalic {{IPA|/l/}}. In the morpheme-final position only {{IPA|[ɔʊː]}} occurs (with the {{sc2|THOUGHT}} vowel being realized as {{IPA|[ɔə ~ ɔː ~ ɔʊə]}}), so that ''all'' {{IPA|[ɔʊː]}} is always distinct from ''or'' {{IPA|[ɔə]}}. Before the intervocalic {{IPA|/l/}} {{IPA|[ɔʊː]}} is the banned diphthong, though here either of the {{sc2|THOUGHT}} vowels can occur, depending on morphology (compare ''falling'' {{IPA|[ˈfɔʊlɪn]}} with ''aweless'' {{IPA|[ˈɔəlɪs]}}).<ref name="aoe">{{Accents of English|hide1=yes|hide3=yes}}</ref>

In Cockney, the main difference between {{IPA|/ɪ/}} and {{IPA|/ɪə/}}, {{IPA|/e/}} and {{IPA|/eə/}} as well as {{IPA|/ɒ/}} and {{IPA|/ɔə/}} is length, not quality, so that ''his'' {{IPA|[ɪz]}}, ''merry'' {{IPA|[ˈmɛɹɪi]}} and ''Polly'' {{IPA|[ˈpɒlɪi ~ ˈpɔlɪi]}} differ from ''here's'' {{IPA|[ɪəz ~ ɪːz]}}, ''Mary'' {{IPA|[ˈmɛəɹɪi ~ ˈmɛːɹɪi]}} and ''poorly'' {{IPA|[ˈpɔəlɪi ~ ˈpɔːlɪi]}} (see [[cure-force merger]]) mainly in length. In broad Cockney, the contrast between {{IPA|/æ/}} and {{IPA|/æʊ/}} is also mainly one of length; compare ''hat'' {{IPA|[æʔ]}} with ''out'' {{IPA|[æəʔ ~ æːʔ]}} (cf. the near-RP form {{IPA|[æʊʔ]}}, with a wide closing diphthong).<ref name="aoe"/>

===="Long" and "short" vowel letters in spelling and the classroom teaching of reading====
{{Hatnote|Several terms redirect here. For the Minor League Baseball classification called "Short A", see [[Class A Short Season]]. For the Cyrillic letters, see [[Short I (Cyrillic)]] and [[Short U (Cyrillic)]].}}
In the teaching of English, vowels are commonly said to have a "short" and a "long" version. The terms "short" and "long" are not accurate from a linguistic point of view—at least in the case of Modern English—as the vowels are not actually short and long versions of the same sound; the terminology is a historical holdover due to their arising from proper vowel length in [[Middle English]]. The phonetic values of these vowels are shown in the table below.

{| class=wikitable
! letter !! "short" !! "long" !! examples
|- align=center
! a
| {{IPA|/æ/}} || {{IPA|/eɪ/}} || ''mat'' / ''mate''
|- align=center
! e
| {{IPA|/ɛ/}} || {{IPA|/iː/}} || ''pet'' / ''Pete''
|- align=center
! i
| {{IPA|/ɪ/}} || {{IPA|/aɪ/}} || ''twin'' / ''twine''
|- align=center
! o
| {{IPA|/ɒ/}} || {{IPA|/oʊ/}} || ''not'' / ''note''
|- align=center
! oo
| {{IPA|/ʊ/}} || {{IPA|/uː/}} || ''wood'' / ''wooed''
|- align=center
! u
| {{IPA|/ʌ/}} || {{IPA|/juː/}} || ''cub'' / ''cube''
|}

In a phonetic transcription system that uses [[pronunciation respelling]], "long" and "short" vowel letters are written in a form a normal reader of the language would unambiguously know how to pronounce; eg. "ay" or "ey" are used for {{IPA|/ɑː/}} (a long "a"), and "ee" or "iy" are used for {{IPA|/iː/}} (a long "i"). Whilst many dictionaries use pronunciation respelling, other dictionaries, notably the [[Merriam-Webster]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/assets/mw/static/pdf/help/guide-to-pronunciation.pdf|title=Guide to Pronunciation|publisher=Merriam-Webster|access-date=2018-10-18}}</ref> use a [[Macron (diacritic)|macron]] over a vowel to indicate a long vowel; for example, ⟨ā⟩ is be used to represent the IPA sound {{IPA|/eɪ/}}, or a [[breve]] to indicate a short vowel (e.g. ⟨ă⟩ to represent the IPA sound /æ/), as is used in the [[American Heritage Dictionary]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.ahdictionary.com/word/howtouse.html|title=Guide to the Online American Heritage Dictionary|publisher=The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language|access-date=2025-05-31}}</ref> See [[Pronunciation respelling for English#Traditional respelling systems|Pronunciation respelling for English]] for a comprehensive comparative table of pronunciation respelling systems for English.

==Origin==

Vowel length may often be traced to [[assimilation (linguistics)|assimilation]]. In Australian English, the second element {{IPA|[ə]}} of a diphthong {{IPA|[eə]}} has assimilated to the preceding vowel, giving the pronunciation of ''bared'' as {{IPA|[beːd]}}, creating a contrast with the short vowel in ''bed'' {{IPA|[bed]}}.

Another common source is the vocalization<!--This means changing a consonant into a vowel. No article describes this concept in general, but l-vocalization describes the case of l changing to a vowel.--> of a consonant such as the [[voiced velar fricative]] {{IPA|[ɣ]}} or [[voiced palatal fricative]] or, in fact, an approximant (such as the typical realisation of the English [[diaphoneme]] /r/). A historically important example is the [[laryngeal theory]], which states that long vowels in the [[Indo-European languages]] were formed from short vowels, followed by any one of the several "laryngeal" sounds of [[Proto-Indo-European]] (conventionally written h<sub>1</sub>, h<sub>2</sub> and h<sub>3</sub>). When a laryngeal sound followed a vowel, it was later lost in most Indo-European languages, and the preceding vowel became long. However, Proto-Indo-European had long vowels of other origins as well, usually as the result of older sound changes, such as [[Szemerényi's law]] and [[Stang's law]].

Vowel length may also have arisen as an [[allophonic]] quality of a single vowel phoneme, which may have then become split in two phonemes. For example, the Australian English phoneme {{IPA|/æː/}} was created by the incomplete application of a rule extending {{IPA|/æ/}} before certain voiced consonants, a phenomenon known as the [[bad–lad split]]. An alternative pathway to the phonemicization of allophonic vowel length is the shift of a vowel of a formerly-different quality to become the short counterpart of a vowel pair. That too is exemplified by Australian English, whose contrast between {{IPA|/a/}} (as in ''duck'') and {{IPA|/aː/}} (as in ''dark'') was brought about by a [[open vowel|lowering]] of the earlier {{IPA|/ʌ/}}.

[[Estonian language|Estonian]], a [[Finnic language]], has a rare{{citation needed|date=December 2014|reason=Is the rare thing really supposed to be length phonemicization by loss of allophony trigger; and not the shift from a two-length system into a three-length one?}} phenomenon in which allophonic length variation has become phonemic after the deletion of the suffixes causing the allophony. Estonian had already inherited two vowel lengths from [[Proto-Finnic]], but a third one was then introduced. For example, the Finnic imperative marker *''-k'' caused the preceding vowels to be articulated shorter. After the deletion of the marker, the allophonic length became phonemic, as shown in the example above.

==Notations{{anchor|Vowel length notation}}==
===Latin alphabet===

====IPA====
In the [[International Phonetic Alphabet]] the sign {{IPA|ː}} (not a colon, but two triangles facing each other in an [[hourglass shape]]; Unicode {{code|U+02D0}}) is used for both vowel and consonant length. This may be doubled for an extra-long sound, or the top half ({{IPA|ˑ}}) may be used to indicate that a sound is "half long". A [[breve]] is used to mark an [[extra-short]] vowel or consonant.

Estonian has a three-way [[phonemic contrast]]:
:''saada'' {{IPA|[saːːda]}} "to get" (overlong)
:''saada'' {{IPA|[saːda]}} "send!" (long)
:''sada'' {{IPA|[sada]}} "hundred" (short)

Although not phonemic, a half-long distinction can also be illustrated in certain accents of English:
:''bead'' {{IPA|[biːd]}}
:''beat'' {{IPA|[biˑt]}}
:''bid'' {{IPA|[bɪˑd]}}
:''bit'' {{IPA|[bɪt]}}

====Diacritics====
* [[Macron (diacritic)|Macron]] (ā), used to indicate a long vowel in [[Māori language|Māori]], [[Hawaiian language|Hawaiian]], [[Samoan language|Samoan]], [[Latvian language|Latvian]] and many transcription schemes, including romanizations for [[Sanskrit]] and [[Arabic]], the [[Hepburn romanization]] for [[Japanese language|Japanese]], and [[Yale romanization of Korean|Yale]] for [[Korean language|Korean]]. While not part of their standard orthography, the macron is used as a teaching aid in modern [[Latin]] and [[Ancient Greek]] textbooks. Macron is also used in modern official [[Cyrillic]] orthographies of some minority languages ([[Mansi language|Mansi]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.babel.gwi.uni-muenchen.de/media/downloads/grammar/NorthernMansi/Phonology/Northern-Mansi_Phonemes_unified.pdf|title=OB-UGRIC LANGUAGES: CONCEPTUAL STRUCTURES, LEXICON, CONSTRUCTIONS, CATEGORIES TRANSLITERATION TABLES FOR NORTHERN MANSI : Counterparts of Cyrillic, FUT Counterparts of Cyrillic, FUT Cyrillic, FUT and IPA characters and IPA characters and IPA characters for Northern Mansi|website=Babel.gwi.uni-muenchen.de|access-date=30 May 2018}}</ref> [[Kildin Sami]], [[Evenki language|Evenki]]).
* [[Breve]]s (ă) are used to mark short vowels in several [[linguistic]] transcription systems, as well as in [[Vietnamese language|Vietnamese]] and Alvarez-Hale's orthography for [[O'odham language|O'odham]].
* [[Acute accent]] (á), used to indicate a long vowel in [[Czech language|Czech]], [[Slovak language|Slovak]], [[Old Norse]], [[Hungarian language|Hungarian]], [[Irish language|Irish]], traditional [[Scottish Gaelic]] (for long [oː] ó, [eː] é, as opposed to [ɛː] è, [ɔː] ò) and pre-20th-century transcriptions of [[Sanskrit]], [[Arabic]], etc.
** An [[Apex (diacritic)|apex]], which was a light acute accent that was angled lower and aligned with a letter's right, was used in [[Classical Latin]].  (However, for I, a taller ꟾ was sometimes used instead.)
* [[Circumflex]] (â), used for example in [[Welsh language|Welsh]]. The circumflex is occasionally used as a surrogate for the macrons, particularly in [[Hawaiian language|Hawaiian]] and in the [[Kunrei-shiki]] romanization of [[Japanese language|Japanese]], or in transcriptions of [[Old High German]]. In transcriptions of [[Middle High German]], a system where inherited lengths are marked with the circumflex and new lengths with the macron is occasionally used.
* [[Grave accent]] (à) is used in [[Scottish Gaelic]], with a e i o u. (In traditional spelling, [ɛː] is è and [ɔː] is ò as in gnè, pòcaid, Mòr (personal name), while [eː] is é and [oː] is ó, as in dé, mór.)
* [[Ogonek]] (ą), used in [[Lithuanian language|Lithuanian]] to indicate long vowels.
* [[Diaeresis (diacritic)|Trema]] (ä), used in [[Aymara language|Aymara]] to indicate long vowels.

====Additional letters====
* ''Vowel doubling'', used consistently in [[Estonian language|Estonian]], [[Finnish language|Finnish]], [[Lombard language|Lombard]], [[Navajo language|Navajo]] and [[Somali language|Somali]], and in closed syllables in [[Dutch language|Dutch]], [[Afrikaans]], and [[West Frisian language|West Frisian]]. Example: Finnish ''tuuli'' {{IPA|/ˈtuːli/}} 'wind' vs. ''tuli'' {{IPA|/ˈtuli/}} 'fire'.
** Estonian also has a rare "overlong" vowel length but does not distinguish it from the normal long vowel in writing, as they are distinguishable by context; see the example below.
* ''Consonant doubling'' after short vowels is very common in [[Swedish language|Swedish]] and other Germanic languages, including English. The system is somewhat inconsistent, especially in loanwords, around consonant clusters and with word-final nasal consonants. Examples:
: ''Consistent use:'' ''byta'' {{IPA|/²byːta/}} 'to change' vs ''bytta'' {{IPA|/²bʏtːa/}} 'tub' and ''koma'' {{IPA|/²koːma/}} 'coma' vs ''komma'' {{IPA|/²kɔma/}} 'to come'
: ''Inconsistent use:'' ''fält'' {{IPA|/ˈfɛlt/}} 'a field' and ''kam'' {{IPA|/ˈkamː/}} 'a comb' (but the verb 'to comb' is ''kamma'')
* Classical [[Milanese]] orthography uses consonant doubling in closed short syllables, e.g., ''lenguagg'' 'language' and ''pubblegh'' 'public'.<ref>[[:it:s:Autore:Carlo Porta|Carlo Porta]] on the Italian [[Wikisource]]</ref>
* ''ie'' is used to mark the long {{IPA|/iː/}} sound in [[German language|German]] because of the preservation and the generalization of a historic ''ie'' spelling, which originally represented the sound {{IPA|/iə̯/}}. In [[Low German]], a following ''e'' letter lengthens other vowels as well, e.g., in the name [[Kues]] {{IPA|/kuːs/}}.
* A following ''h'' is frequently used in [[German language|German]] and older [[Swedish language|Swedish]] spelling, e.g., German ''Zahn'' {{IPA|[tsaːn]}} 'tooth'.
* In [[Czech language|Czech]], the additional letter ''ů'' is used for the long U sound, and the character is known as a [[kroužek]], e.g., ''kůň'' "horse". (It actually developed from the [[typographic ligature|ligature]] "uo", which noted the [[diphthong]] {{IPA|/uo/}} until it shifted to {{IPA|/uː/}}.)

====Other signs====
* [[Colon (letter)|Colon]], {{angle bracket|꞉}}, from [[Americanist phonetic notation]], and used in orthographies based on it such as [[Oʼodham language|Oʼodham]], [[Mohawk language|Mohawk]] or [[Seneca language|Seneca]]. The triangular colon {{angle bracket|ː}} in the [[International Phonetic Alphabet]] derives from this.
* [[Interpunct#Letter|Middot]] or half-colon, {{angle bracket|ꞏ}}, a more common variant in the Americanist tradition, also used in language orthographies.
* [[Saltillo (linguistics)#The saltillo letter|Saltillo]] (straight apostrophe), used in [[Miꞌkmaq language|Miꞌkmaq]], as evidenced by the name itself. This is the convention of the Listuguj orthography (Miꞌgmaq), and a common substitution for the acute accent (Míkmaq) of the Francis-Smith orthography.

====No distinction====
Some languages make no distinction in writing. This is particularly the case with ancient languages such as [[Old English]]. Modern edited texts often use macrons with long vowels, however. [[Australian English]] does not distinguish the vowels {{IPA|/æ/}} from {{IPA|/æː/}} in spelling, with words like 'span' or 'can' having different pronunciations depending on meaning. Other modern languages that do not represent vowel length in their standard orthography include [[Serbo-Croatian]], [[Slovene language|Slovene]] and [[Hausa language|Hausa]].

===Other writing systems===
In non-Latin writing systems, a variety of mechanisms have also evolved.
* In abjads derived from the [[Aramaic alphabet]], notably [[Arabic alphabet|Arabic]] and [[Hebrew alphabet|Hebrew]], long vowels are written with consonant letters (mostly [[approximant consonant]] letters) in a process called ''[[mater lectionis]] e.g.'' in Modern Arabic the long vowel {{IPA|/aː/}} is represented by the letter ''ا'' ([[Aleph|Alif]]), the vowels {{IPA|/uː/}} and {{IPA|/oː/}} are represented by ''و'' ([[Waw (letter)|wāw]]), and the vowels {{IPA|/iː/}} and {{IPA|/eː/}} are represented by ''ي'' ([[Yodh|yāʼ]]), while short vowels are typically omitted entirely. Most of these scripts also have optional diacritics that can be used to mark short vowels when needed.
* In [[South-Asian]] [[abugida]]s, such as [[Devanagari]] or the [[Thai alphabet]], there are different vowel signs for short and long vowels.
* [[Ancient Greek]] also had distinct vowel signs, but only for some long vowels; the vowel letters {{lang|grc|η}} ([[eta]]) and {{lang|grc|ω}} ([[omega]]) originally represented long forms of the vowels represented by the letters {{lang|grc|ε}} ([[epsilon]], literally "bare ''e''") and ''ο'' ([[omicron]] – literally "small ''o''", by contrast with ''omega'' or "large ''o''"). The other vowel letters of Ancient Greek, {{lang|grc|α}} ([[alpha]]), {{lang|grc|ι}} ([[iota]]) and {{lang|grc|υ}} ([[upsilon]]), could represent either short or long vowel phones.
*[[Japanese phonology]]:
** In the [[hiragana]] syllabary, long vowels are usually indicated by adding a vowel character after. For vowels {{IPA|/aː/}}, {{IPA|/iː/}}, and {{IPA|/uː/}}, the corresponding independent vowel is added. Thus: {{lang|ja|あ}} (a), {{lang|ja|おかあさん}}, "okaasan", mother; {{lang|ja|い}} (i), にいがた "Niigata", city in northern Japan (usually {{lang|ja|新潟}}, in [[kanji]]); {{lang|ja|う}} (u), {{lang|ja|りゅう}} "ryuu" (usu. {{lang|ja|竜}}), dragon. The mid-vowels {{IPA|/eː/}} and {{IPA|/oː/}} may be written with {{lang|ja|え}} (e) (rare) ({{lang|ja|ねえさん}} ({{lang|ja|姉さん}}), neesan, "elder sister") and {{lang|ja|お}} (o) [{{lang|ja|おおきい}} (usu {{lang|ja|大きい}}), ookii, big], or with {{lang|ja|い}} (i) ({{lang|ja|めいれい}} ({{lang|ja|命令}}), "meirei", command/order) and {{lang|ja|う}} (u) ({{lang|ja|おうさま}} ({{lang|ja|王様}}), ousama, "king") depending on etymological, morphological, and historic grounds.
** Most long vowels in the [[katakana]] syllabary are written with a special bar symbol {{lang|ja|ー}} (vertical in [[vertical writing]]), called a [[chōon]], as in {{lang|ja|メーカー}} ''mēkā'' "maker" instead of {{lang|ja|メカ}} ''meka'' "[[mecha]]". However, some long vowels are written with additional vowel characters, as with hiragana, with the distinction being orthographically significant.
**Some analyses make a distinction between a long vowel and a succession of two identical vowels, citing pairs such as {{lang|ja|砂糖屋}} ''satōya'' 'sugar shop' {{IPA|[satoːja]}} vs. {{langx|ja|里親|satooya|lit=foster parent|label=none}} {{IPA|[satooja]}}. They are usually identical in normal speech, but when enunciated a distinction may be made with a pause or a [[glottal stop]] inserted between two identical vowels.{{sfnp|Labrune|2012|pp=45–46}}
**In transcription: ''ts'''u'''ki'' {{IPA|/tuki/}} 'moon' vs. ''ts'''ū'''ki'' {{IPA|/tuuki/}} 'airflow'.
* In the Korean [[Hangul]] alphabet, vowel length is not distinguished in normal writing. Some dictionaries use a double dot, {{angle bracket|:}}, for example {{lang|ko|무:}} "[[Daikon radish]]".
* In the Classic [[Maya script]], also based on syllabic characters, long vowels in monosyllabic roots were generally written with word-final syllabic signs ending in the vowel -''i'' rather than an echo-vowel. Hence, ''chaach'' "basket", with a long vowel, was written as ''cha-chi'' (compare ''chan'' "sky", with a short vowel, written as ''cha-na''). If the nucleus of the syllable was itself ''i'', however, the word-final vowel for indicating length was -''a'': ''tziik''- "to count; to honour, to sanctify" was written as ''tzi-ka'' (compare ''sitz' ''"appetite", written as ''si-tz'i'').

==See also==
*[[Gemination]]
*[[Length (phonetics)]]
*[[Mora (linguistics)]]

==References==
{{reflist}}
*{{citation
|last=Labrune
|first=Laurence
|year=2012
|title=The Phonology of Japanese
|publisher=Oxford University Press
|place=Oxford, England
|isbn=978-0-19-954583-4
}}

==External links==
{{refbegin}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20051125044824/http://www.cc.jyu.fi/~tojan/rlang/finn2.htm Some Features of the Vernacular Finnish of Jyväskylä]
{{refend}}

{{Suprasegmentals}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vowel Length}}
[[Category:Phonetics]]
[[Category:Vowels]]