Arabic letter nūn, initial form

It is Arabic nūn in its initial joining shape.

Nūn represents the consonant /n/. When it begins a connected word, Arabic shaping displays its initial form. In ordinary text, the underlying character is ن; the writing system chooses the visible shape from the letters around it.

Arabic writing developed through Nabataean, which came from Aramaic. Dated inscriptions with a full Arabic letter set appear by the late fifth century CE. Arabic belongs to a wider script history that also includes Phoenician, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Syriac traditions.

How do I type Arabic nūn?

Type ن in Arabic text; shaping supplies the initial form.

ﻧ is a compatibility presentation form, kept for older data and interchange with older systems. Unicode recommends using the main Arabic letters and letting text software choose their joining shapes. Compatibility normalization can turn ﻧ into ن, so software may change the stored character while keeping the same letter.