In phonetics, alveolo-palatal (alveolopalatal, alveo-palatal or alveopalatal) consonants, sometimes synonymous with pre-palatal consonants, are intermediate in articulation between the coronal and dorsal consonants, or which have simultaneous alveolar and palatal articulation. In the official IPA chart, alveolo-palatals would appear between the retroflex and palatal consonants, but are omitted for "lack of space". characterize the alveolo-palatals as palatalized postalveolars (and thus as palato-alveolars), articulated with the blade of the tongue behind the alveolar ridge and the body of the tongue raised toward the palate, whereas describes them as advanced palatals (pre-palatals), the furthest front of the dorsal consonants, articulated with the body of the tongue approaching the alveolar ridge.
Sibilants
The alveolo-palatal sibilants are often used in varieties of Chinese such as Mandarin, Hakka, and Wu, as well as other East Asian languages such as Japanese and Korean, Tibeto-Burman such as Tibetan and Burmese as well as Tai languages such as Thai, Lao, Shan and Zhuang. Alveolo-palatal sibilants are also a feature of many Slavic languages, such as Polish, Russian, and Serbo-Croatian, and of Northwest Caucasian languages, such as Abkhaz and Ubykh. The alveolo-palatal consonants included in the International Phonetic Alphabet are:
{|class="wikitable"
! rowspan="2" | Historical IPA
! rowspan=2 | Modern IPA
! rowspan=2 | Description
! colspan=6 | Example
|-style="background:gray; color:black"
! Language
! Orthography
! IPA
! Meaning
|-
! align="center" colspan=2 style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiceless alveolo-palatal sibilant
| Mandarin
| 小 (xiǎo)
|
| small
|-
! align="center" colspan=2 style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiced alveolo-palatal sibilant
| Polish
| zioło
|
| herb
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate
| Serbo-Croatian
| kuća / кућа
|
| house
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiced alveolo-palatal affricate
| Japanese
| 地震 (jishin)
|
| earthquake
|}
Some phoneticians may consider and to be equivalent to and , or and , though others may still maintain a distinction. They are the sibilant homologues of the non-sibilant pre-palatal fricatives and .
Stops, nasals, and liquids
Symbols for alveolo-palatal consonants are sometimes used in Sinological circles (a circumflex accent is also sometimes seen), but they are not officially recognized by the IPA, though they do occasionally appear in JIPA publications.<!--They may be simple palatal or palatalized consonants, classified as alveolo-palatals because they pattern with the alveolo-palatal sibilants of the language rather than because they are alveolo-palatal in articulation.--> In standard IPA, they can be transcribed as (retracted and palatalized alveolars) or (advanced palatals).
For example, the Polish nasal represented with the letter ń is a palatalized laminal alveolar nasal and thus often described as alveolo-palatal rather than palatal. The "palatal" consonants of Indigenous Australian languages are also often closer to alveolo-palatal in their articulation.
{|class="wikitable"
! rowspan="2" | Para-IPA
! rowspan="2" | IPA
! rowspan="2" | Description
! colspan="4" | Example
|-
! Language
! Orthography
! IPA
! Meaning
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiceless plosive
| Korean
|
|
| 'dust'
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiced plosive
| Korean
|
|
| 'firefly'
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiced nasal
| Nuosu
| ꑌ nyi
|
| 'sit'
|-
!align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
!align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiceless nasal
|Lower Xumi
|
|
|'clean'
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiced lateral
| Catalan
| ull
|
| 'eye'
|-
! align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
!align="center" style="font-size: 20px" |
| Voiceless lateral
| Upper Xumi
|
|
| 'flavorless'
|}
Contrasting with palatovelar consonants
In Migueleño Chiquitano, phoneme /ȶ/ contrasts with phoneme /c̠/; in the syllabic coda (or intervowel) position in conservative Irish, laminal alveolo-palatal phoneme /ṉʲ/ (termed fortis slender coronal nasal, orthographic example inn) contrasts with both dorsal palatal phoneme /ɲ/ (termed slender dorsal nasal, orthographic example ing or -nc-) and apical palatalized alveolar phoneme /nʲ/ (termed lenis slender coronal nasal, orthographic example in); while general Irish other than Munster Irish contrasts alveolo-palatal nasal only with palatal nasal. In both cases, the palatal consonants work as the palatalization of velar consonants while alveolo-palatal consonants work as the palatalization of alveolar consonants.
In some spoken Chinese varieties, such as the in , contrast the alveolo-palatal nasal with the palato-velar nasal. For example, the following contrasting pairs can be found in Luchuan Ngai.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Luchuan Ngai contrasting pairs
|-
! EMC !! Character !! Pronunciation !! Tone
|-
| newH || 尿 || rowspan="2" | niau || 去
|-
| nraewX || 撓 || 阳平
|-
| nyew || 饒 || ȵiau || 阳平
|-
| ngewH || 澆 || ɲ̠iau || 上
|-
| nrjem || 黏 || niam || 阴平
|-
| nyemX || 染 || ȵiam || 上
|-
| ngjaem || 嚴 || ɲ̠iam || 阳平
|-
| rowspan="2" | nyin || 人 || ȵin || rowspan="2" |阳平
|-
| 仁 || ɲ̠in <!--
|-
| n || [[wikt:|] ] || Example || Example
|-
| n || [[wikt:|] ] || Example || Example
|-
| n || [[wikt:|] ] || Example || Example
|-
| n || [[wikt:|] ] || Example || Example-->
|}
Although a number of spoken Chinese varieties, such as standard Mandarin, also contrast EMC alveolo-palatal nasal with velar nasal of class III (palatalizing medial), most don't contrast them in a way that alveolo-palatal differs from palatal. For example, in Hakka, alveolo-palatal nasal marginally contrasts with velar nasal under close front medials, but there is little sign of palatal contrasts.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ M pairs
|-
! EMC !! Character !! Pronunciation !! Tone
|-
| rowspan="2" | nrjep || 聶 || niap || rowspan="4" | 阳
|-
| 鑷 || ȵiap
|-
| nyip || 入 || ȵap
|-
| net || 捏 || ŋiap
|}
Thus most frequently, the Sinologist use of ȵ instead of ɲ is not to indicate a contrast, but to emphasize its primary allophone not to be the Turkish [ɲ], or to indicate its coronal origin or that it has evolved with other dorsal consonants which have become alveolopalatals, where ɲ is reserved for postpalatals evolved from dorsal consonants. However, since ȵ has also been unfortunately used by some for Meixian Hakka, the distinction of usage has become vague. ȶ, on the other hand, has retained its accurate usage representing phonemes in certain spoken Chinese in Hengyang and has never been applied on Hakka or on certain Mandarin in or near Shandong.