Arabic Letter Gaf

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On Windows, the 2026 mappings are Shift+K for Urdu and G for Central Kurdish. Persian uses a Persian layout, so the Urdu shortcut may not work.

What sound does گ make?

It represents the hard g in English “go.”

Persian and Urdu use gaf for this sound. The letter joins its neighbors, so its outline changes with its position in a word; the connected form is still gaf.

Why does گ resemble ک?

Persian gaf developed from kaf with an added bar.

Persian writers adapted Arabic script for /g/, a sound without its own letter in Arabic. Some 11th-century Persian documents use ک for both /k/ and /g/, so an old text may spell a word differently from modern Persian.

A 2003 Unicode proposal documents related kaf-based letters for /g/ in Jawi, Moroccan Arabic, and Amazigh. Those forms are related to Persian gaf, but they are not interchangeable with it.