The Tetum alphabet is used to write Tetum. It is based on the Latin alphabet and contains 24 letters:
| Majuscule Forms (also called uppercase or capital letters) | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| A | B | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | Ñ | O | P | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Z |
| Minuscule Forms (also called lowercase or small letters) | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| a | b | d | e | f | g | h | i | j | k | l | m | n | ñ | o | p | r | s | t | u | v | w | x | z |
| International Phonetic Alphabet values | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| a | b | d | e | f | ɡ | h | i | ʒ | k | l | m | n | ɲ | o | p | ɾ | s | t | u | v | w | ʃ | z |
The letters are named: á, bé, dé, é, efe, ge, agá, í, jota, kapa, ele, eme, ene, ene ho til, ó, pé, erre, ese, té, ú, vé, vé-kaduak, xis, zé.
The accented letters á, é, í, ó, and ú are also used.
The letter W only occurs in some words of dialectal or foreign origin.
The letters G, J, Ñ, P, V, X, and Z and the digraphs LL (ele-kaduak, /ʎ/) and RR (erre-kaduak, /r/) only occur in loanwords.
The letters C (sé), Q (ké), and Y (ípsilon) are not used in Tetum, except in foreign proper names and international symbols.
The apostrophe (kapa-tatolan) is used to denote glottal stop.