Ph words: when ph says /f/
Ph is the /f/ sound in phone, dolphin and graph. It shows up mostly in longer words that came into English from Greek. Hear every word and try the listening game.
Ph words list (31 words)
Tap a word to hear it.
Ph at the beginning
Ph in the middle
Ph at the end
Ph words game: listen and find
Hear a word from the list and pick it from four look-alike words. Eight rounds, about two minutes.
Ph words spelling game: build the word
Hear a word and build it from letter tiles, one sound at a time. Letter pairs like sh or ck come as one tile, because they spell one sound. Six rounds.
Short answer
What are ph words?
Ph words are words where the letters p and h together spell the /f/ sound, as in phone, photo, dolphin, elephant and graph. The ph spelling comes mostly from words borrowed from Greek, so it appears in many science and technology words, such as phonics, microphone and telephone. Ph can come at the beginning, middle or end of a word, and it is usually taught after sh, ch and th because the words tend to be longer.
- Ph is a digraph: p and h together say /f/, the same sound as the letter f.
- Most ph words come from Greek: phone comes from the Greek word for sound, and photo from the word for light.
- Ph can appear at the start (phone), middle (dolphin) or end (graph) of a word.
- When p and h belong to different parts of a word, as in uphill and shepherd, they are not a digraph and do not say /f/.
About ph words
Ph makes the same sound as f: the top teeth rest on the bottom lip and air flows out with no voice. The reason English has two spellings for one sound is history. Words borrowed from Greek, where there was a separate letter for this sound, were written with ph, while older English words kept f. So phone, photo, alphabet and elephant use ph, but fish, fun and fox use f.
Because ph words are mostly borrowed, they tend to be longer and use other patterns too, so ph is usually taught after the first digraphs. Good first words are graph, phonics and dolphin, where the rest of the word follows patterns a child already knows. Words like phone and phase need silent e, and pheasant, sapphire and physical have spellings that come much later. The groups show that ph can sit anywhere in a word, unlike ck or wh.
A handy clue for older children is that many ph words share parts: phone (sound) in telephone, microphone and saxophone; photo (light) in photograph; graph (write) in paragraph and autograph. Spotting these parts helps with reading and spelling long words. The one case to watch is when p and h sit next to each other but belong to different word parts, as in uphill (up plus hill) and shepherd (sheep plus herd). There they are read separately and do not say /f/.
Ph words in sentences
Decodable sentences: every word can be sounded out with the patterns on this page, plus a few very common words.
- Phil has a photo of a dolphin.
- The elephant is in the photo.
- I can say the alphabet.
- Ralph got a big trophy.
- Pass me the headphones.
- Phew, the phone did not fall.
- We made a graph in math.
- Read the phrase on the page.
Common mix-ups with ph words
Writing f for ph
Children often spell phone as fone, because the sound is /f/. That is a sensible guess. Teach the Greek word parts (phone, photo, graph) so the child knows which common words use ph.
Reading p and h separately
If phone comes out as puh-hone, the child is reading two letters. Loop ph and say /f/ before reading the rest of the word.
Ph and gh (graph and laugh)
Gh can also say /f/, as in laugh, cough and tough, which confuses children who have just learned ph. Keep gh for later, and on this page point out that every two-letter /f/ starts with p.
Ph words activities
Photo word hunt
Take photos of things around the house or in picture books that are ph words: a phone, headphones, an elephant or dolphin toy, a trophy. Show them one by one, and have your child write the matching ph label for each.
F or ph sort
Write f and ph words on cards: fish, phone, fan, dolphin, fox, graph. Read each card and sort it into two piles, looping the letters that spell /f/ each time.
Word part builder
Make cards for tele, micro, saxo and mega, and one card for phone. Join each to phone and read the new word aloud: telephone, microphone, saxophone, megaphone. Then do the same with graph: para, auto, photo.
Tap the syllables
Many ph words are long. Clap or tap each syllable in dolphin (dol-phin), elephant (el-e-phant) and alphabet (al-pha-bet), then find which syllable holds the ph.
Ph words: frequently asked questions
What are some easy ph words for kids?
Graph, phonics, dolphin, phone, photo, elephant, alphabet and trophy are good ones to start with. They are common and use patterns many children know.
Why does ph make the f sound?
Most ph words came into English from Greek, which had a separate letter for a sound close to /f/. Latin wrote that letter as ph, and English kept the spelling.
Does ph always say f?
Almost always. The exceptions are words where p and h belong to different parts of the word, such as uphill and shepherd, and a few names such as Stephen, where ph says /v/.
When do children learn ph?
Usually in first or second grade, after sh, ch, th and ck, because most ph words are longer and include other spelling patterns.
Practise next
- Sh wordsSh is the quiet sound in ship and fish, the one you make when you ask someone to be quiet. Hear every word, read the sentences, and try the listening game.
- Th wordsTh is the digraph where the tongue peeks out between the teeth. It has two sounds, the quiet one in thin and the buzzing one in this. Hear every word and try the game.
- Ch wordsCh is the sharp sound in chin and lunch, a bit like a small sneeze. Hear every word, learn when to write tch instead of ch, and try the listening game.
- Consonant blendsA consonant blend is two consonants side by side where you still hear both sounds, like fr in frog and st in nest. Hear every word, read the sentences, and play the game.