It is customary to represent the German vowel system as consisting of seven short vowels / i / , / e / , / a / , / o / , /u/, / ö / , /ü/ and seven long vowels / i : / , / e : / , / a : / , / o : / , / u :/, / ö : / , / ü : /. In this analysis the short vowels have the phonetic value [I, ε, α, ɔ, U, œ, Y], whereas the long vowels are described as consisting of short vowel plus the phoneme / : /.

[: ] obviously does not only mean length, but it includes several features of quality, i.e. tenseness, fronting, and raising. It will be noted that the contrast tense-lax applies to every single pair: [i — I ] , [e — ε], [a — α], [o — ɔ], [u — U] [ö — œ], [ ü — Y].