Mixe–Zoque phonology

The phoneme inventory of Proto-Mixe–Zoquean as reconstructed by Wichmann (1995) can be seen to be relatively simple, but many of the modern languages have been innovative, and some have become quite vowel rich, and some also have introduced a fortis–lenis contrast in the stop series. Although the lateral phoneme is found in a few words in some of the languages, these are probably of onomatopoeic origin.

has also been reconstructed.

Syllables
Mixe–Zoquean languages are characterized by complex syllabic nuclei made up of combinations of vowels together with the glottal stop and in the proto-language. Complex syllable-final consonant clusters are also typical in the daughter languages and can be reconstructed for the proto-language.

Proto-Mixe–Zoquean syllable nuclei could be either:
 * V – short vowel
 * V' – short vowel with glottal stop
 * VV – long vowel
 * V'V – long vowel with medial glottal stop
 * VV' – long vowel with final glottal stop
 * Vh – short vowel with h