oʻ / gʻ

The Letters Oʻ and Gʻ

Level 1

oʻ and gʻ are full letters, not o and g with decoration. oʻ is a closer, rounder o, as in koʻz (eye). gʻ is a gargled sound like a French r, as in togʻ (mountain).

How It Works

oʻ is one of Uzbek's six vowels. It is closer and rounder than o: round your lips and raise your tongue, as for the o in English go, but keep the sound pure without gliding into a w. Next to e, i or y it may sound a little further forward. Plain o is a more open sound, close to the o in British hot. See the vowels o and a.

These pairs show that the mark is not optional:

  • ot (horse; name) / oʻt (grass; fire)
  • ol- (take) / oʻl- (die)
  • bor (there is) / boʻr (chalk)
  • tor (narrow) / toʻr (net)

gʻ is a consonant made at the very back of the mouth, with the throat buzzing. It sounds like a French or German r, or a softly gargled gh: togʻ (mountain), bogʻ (garden), gʻisht (brick), Fargʻona. It is the buzzing partner of x. See q, x, gʻ and h.

A capital letter keeps the mark: Oʻzbekiston, Gʻafur. The correct character is the turned comma (Unicode U+02BB). Many websites use a plain apostrophe instead because keyboards lack the right key, but it is a different sign from the ʼ of the apostrophe sign.

At the end of some longer nouns, q turns into gʻ before an ending that starts with a vowel: qishloq (village) becomes qishlogʻi. See k and q softening.

A reform approved by the Senate on 10 September 2026 would write these letters as ö and ğ. This course uses the 1995 spellings oʻ and gʻ.

Examples (5)

  1. Bogʻda oʻt koʻp.

    There is a lot of grass in the garden.

    Word by Word: Garden-in grass many.

    Three words with the turned comma. Without it, oʻt would read as ot, a horse.

  2. Togʻda havo toza.

    The air is clean in the mountains.

    Word by Word: Mountain-in air clean.

    Gʻ in togʻ is the gargled sound, like a French r.

  3. Stolda oʻnta olma bor.

    There are ten apples on the table.

    Word by Word: Table-on ten-piece apple there-is.

    Oʻn (ten) has the closer vowel oʻ. Olma has plain o.

  4. Mening koʻzim ogʻriyapti.

    My eye hurts.

    Word by Word: My eye-my hurt-is.

    Koʻz has oʻ, and ogʻri- (to hurt) has gʻ.

  5. Fargʻona chiroyli shahar.

    Fergana is a beautiful city.

    The city's Uzbek name has gʻ, which English spells with a plain g.

Common Mistakes

  • Dropping the turned comma from oʻ.

    Bogʻda ot koʻp.
    Bogʻda oʻt koʻp.

    Without the mark, ot means horse, so the sentence says there are many horses in the garden. Write oʻt for grass.

  • Writing gh for gʻ, as English spellings do.

    Toghda havo toza.
    Togʻda havo toza.

    Uzbek has one letter for this sound. Write gʻ with the turned comma, never gh.

How It Connects

Tap a pattern to see what it builds on and what it leads to.

oʻ / gʻLevel 1The Letters Oʻ and Gʻ

Learn This First

Builds on The Uzbek Latin Alphabet.