Word Order: Tagalog has a flexible word order, typically Verb-Subject-Object or Subject-Verb-Object.  So you can say ‘Kicked he the ball’ or ‘He kicked the ball’.

Sounds: English sounds ‘f’ and ‘v’ are not present in Tagalog; instead, the sounds ‘b’ and ‘p’ are used.  There is also no distinction in Tagalog between the ‘i’ sound in ‘sit’ and the ‘i’ sound i ‘site’.

Dialects: Batangas, Cavite, Laguna, and Bikol are all known dialects of Tagalog.

Writing System: Tagalog is currently written using the Latin alphabet, but before Spanish colonization it was written in Baybayin, which is an alpha-syllabic writing system; each symbol is composed of a consonant and default vowel sound, with diacritics used if other vowels were to be subbed in.