Even though Akeanon is not formally taught at any level, its writing is still fairly conventionalized. Most letters are pronounced as they would be in the neighboring language Hiligaynon or in the national language Tagalog.
The one major characteristic of Akeanon is the voiced velar fricative/approximant [ɣ/ɰ], similar to the <g> in Spanish. Although it is a consonant, it is represented by the symbol <e>, probably because of its phonetic similarity to the schwa-sound present e.g. in the neighboring Kinaray-a, where it is also represented by <e>. The Akeanon <e> is historically derived from the lateral [l], which is obvious in the name of the name-saking river Aklan, locally pronounced as Akean, from which the name Akeanon is derived. Other examples of this cross-linguistic alternation are Akeanon eáwas vs. Hiligaynon láwas ‘body’, Akeanon baeay vs. Hiligaynon balay, Akeanon toe’an vs. Hiligaynon tul’an ‘bone’, or Akeanon bakae vs. Hiligaynon bakal ‘buy’. The original [l] sound is replaced by the velar sound in all positions, as illustrated above, except when directly adjacent to the vowel [i], as in likod ‘back’ (same form in Akeanon and Hiligaynon). Since the two sounds are in complementary distribution, they are not only historically related, but can be considered allophones in the modern language. However, they are still distinguished in writing due to their obvious phonetic difference.
Most other letters correspond to their IPA values. Stops in final position are unreleased, whether they are voiced or voiceless.
The velar nasal [ŋ] is represented by the digraph <ng> , while the combination [ŋg] is represented by the sequence <ngg>.
The glottal stop [ʔ] is represented by apostrophe <‘>, except in word-initial position, where it remains unwritten because its occurrence is predictable.
Like many other Visayan languages, Akeanon has three phonemic vowels: [a], [i], and [u]. The [u] is represented in writing either by <u> or <o>, whether or not it is pronounced a little lower as [o]. Like in Hiligaynon, the original schwa (retained in neighboring Kinaray-a) has merged with [u].
Vowel length is phonemic in Akeanon as in other Visayan languages, and is indicated by an acute accent, e.g. in dáean ‘road’.