Its manner of articulation is fricative, which means it is produced by constricting air flow through a narrow channel at the place of articulation, causing turbulence.
Its phonation is voiceless, which means it is produced without vibrations of the vocal cords. In some languages the vocal cords are actively separated, so it is always voiceless; in others the cords are lax, so that it may take on the voicing of adjacent sounds.
It is an oral consonant, which means that air is not allowed to escape through the nose.
It is a median consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream down the midline of the tongue, rather than to the sides.
May be alveolo-palatal [ɕ] instead.[2] Before /j/, aspiration of /p,t,k/ is realized as devoicing and fortition of /j/.[2] Note, however, that the sequence /tj/ is normally realized as an affricate [t͡ɕ].[3] See Danish phonology
Occurs in words where /h/ comes before /j/ due to h-prothesis of the original word, i.e. /jaɪ̯θ/iaith'language' becomes ei hiaith'her language', resulting in /j/i → /ç/hi.[20] See Welsh phonology
There is also a voiceless post-palatal or pre-velar fricative in some languages, which is articulated slightly farther back compared with the place of articulation of the prototypical voiceless palatal fricative, though not as back as the prototypical voiceless velar fricative. The International Phonetic Alphabet does not have a separate symbol for that sound, though it can be transcribed as ⟨ç̠⟩, ⟨ç⟩ (both symbols denote a retracted⟨ç⟩) or ⟨x̟⟩ (advanced⟨x⟩).
The palatal approximant can in many cases be considered the semivocalic equivalent of the voiceless variant of the close front unrounded vowel[i̥]. The sound is essentially an Australian English ⟨y⟩ (as in year) pronounced strictly without vibration of the vocal cords.
