Symbols
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Kazakh alphabet
The 42 letters in Kazakh alphabetical order, capital and small. The nine Kazakh letters are Ә Ғ Қ Ң Ө Ұ Ү Һ І; each follows the letter it is built on, and І follows Ы.
Punctuation
Kazakh uses « » for quotations, „ “ for quotes inside them, — for dialogue and № before numbers.
Currency
The Kazakhstani tenge, written 500 ₸ or 500 теңге.
Where it's spoken
Kazakhstan, where it is the state language, then the largest Kazakh communities abroad: China (Xinjiang, in Arabic script), Uzbekistan, Russia and western Mongolia.
Kazakh symbols
Horses of the steppe, the golden eagle of the berkutchi hunters and the flag, the wild tulips of Nauryz, the apples of Almaty and the tea of every dastarkhan.
On the map
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The Kazakh alphabet: 42 Cyrillic letters
Kazakh (қазақ тілі) has been written in Cyrillic since 1940. Before that it was written in Arabic script and, from 1929, in a Latin alphabet. The Kazakh Cyrillic alphabet has 42 letters, and nine of them are Kazakh's own: Ә Ғ Қ Ң Ө Ұ Ү Һ І.
In Kazakh alphabetical order the letters are: А Ә Б В Г Ғ Д Е Ё Ж З И Й К Қ Л М Н Ң О Ө П Р С Т У Ұ Ү Ф Х Һ Ц Ч Ш Щ Ъ Ы І Ь Э Ю Я. Each special letter follows the letter it is built on (Ә after А, Ғ after Г, Қ after К, Ң after Н, Ө after О, Ұ and Ү after У, Һ after Х), and І comes after Ы, so the two i-sounds stand side by side.
Ё, Ц, Щ, Ъ, Ь and Э appear mainly in words taken from Russian, and Һ in words from Arabic and Persian; native Kazakh words lean on the nine special letters. Kazakh punctuation uses guillemets « » for quotations, „ “ for quotes inside quotes, a long dash — for dialogue, and before numbers.
The nine Kazakh letters and their sounds
Ә ә is the open front vowel of English "cat", as in сәлем (hello) and әже (grandmother). Ө ө and Ү ү are the rounded front vowels close to German ö and ü: көл is a lake, үй a house and үш three. Ұ ұ is their back partner, a short u as in English "put": ұл (son), ұшақ (aeroplane). І і is a short front i, as in бір (one), екі (two) and тіл (language), while Ы is its back partner, as in жыл (year).
These pairs matter because Kazakh has vowel harmony: a word keeps to front vowels (ә, е, і, ө, ү) or back vowels (а, о, ұ, ы), and its suffixes change to match, so children are балалар but houses are үйлер. Consonants follow suit: Қ қ is a k made at the back of the throat and Ғ ғ a soft, throaty g, and in native words they go with back vowels, while К and Г go with front vowels. Compare қыз (girl) and кіші (small), ағаш (tree) and егін (crop).
Ң ң is the ng of English "sing", as in таң (dawn), мың (thousand) and Жаңа жыл (New Year). Һ һ is a plain h, found mostly in borrowed words such as гауһар (jewel). The name of the country itself, Қазақстан, shows why the special letters matter: written with К instead of Қ it is simply misspelled.
How to type Kazakh letters on a keyboard
Windows includes a Kazakh keyboard layout: add the Kazakh language under Settings › Time & language › Language & region. It keeps the Russian layout and puts the nine Kazakh letters on the top row. macOS has a Kazakh input source, Linux has the XKB layout "kz", and phone keyboard apps such as Gboard offer Kazakh with all 42 letters. Or copy the letters from this page.
Without a Kazakh layout, Microsoft Word types any letter from its code followed by AltX: 04D9 ә, 0493 ғ, 049B қ, 04A3 ң, 04E9 ө, 04B1 ұ, 04AF ү, 04BB һ, 0456 і (for capitals: 04D8 Ә, 0492 Ғ, 049A Қ, 04A2 Ң, 04E8 Ө, 04B0 Ұ, 04AE Ү, 04BA Һ, 0406 І). On a Mac, the Character Viewer finds them by name, such as "ka with descender" or "straight u with stroke". In HTML, write ә for ә, ғ for ғ, қ for қ, ң for ң, ө for ө, ұ for ұ, ү for ү, һ for һ, і for і. The tenge sign is U20B8, ₸.
Watch the look-alikes, because search, spell-checking and sorting treat them as different characters: Kazakh І is the Cyrillic i also used in Ukrainian, not Latin I; Kazakh Қ (ka with descender) is not Bashkir Ҡ; Ң is not the ligature Ҥ; Ә is not Latin Ə; Ө is not Latin Ɵ or Greek Θ; and Ү and Һ are not Latin Y and h. Texts typed before Kazakh layouts were common sometimes used such stand-ins, so it is worth replacing them.
Kazakh Cyrillic and the new Latin alphabet
In 2017 Kazakhstan decided to move Kazakh from Cyrillic to a Latin alphabet. The first version, which wrote special sounds with apostrophes, was replaced in 2018 by one with acute accents, and in 2021 by a version closer to Turkish spelling, with letters such as Ä, Ğ, Ñ, Ö, Ş, Ū, Ü and Q. The switch is meant to be gradual and its timetable has moved more than once; Cyrillic remains the alphabet of everyday life, schools, newspapers and signs.
Outside Kazakhstan the picture differs. Kazakhs in western Mongolia write the same Cyrillic alphabet, while the more than a million Kazakhs of Xinjiang in China use an Arabic-based alphabet. For those Latin and Arabic forms, a converter is the right tool; this page collects the Cyrillic letters that Kazakh text is written in today.
Where Kazakh is spoken
Kazakh is the state language of Kazakhstan, where Russian is also used officially and most people speak both. Unicode's CLDR estimate for Kazakhstan is 13 million Kazakh speakers; there are also large Kazakh communities in China, Uzbekistan, Russia and Mongolia, and a smaller one in Türkiye. Prices are written in tenge, with the sign , as in 500 .
Kazakh is a Kipchak Turkic language, very close to Kyrgyz and Karakalpak and related to Tatar, Bashkir and Uzbek, and more distantly to Turkish. Where Turkish has ç and y, Kazakh often has ш and ж: Turkish üç, yol and yıl are Kazakh үш, жол and жыл. For their alphabets see the Kyrgyz, Kara-Kalpak, Tatar, Bashkir, Uzbek, Turkish and Russian collections; for and the country's emoji see Kazakhstan.
How to use them
5 situationsClick to copyKazakh Alphabet combos
14Worth knowing
- Ұ is the most Kazakh of the letters: none of the alphabets of Russian, Kyrgyz, Tatar, Bashkir or Uzbek uses it.
- In about a century Kazakh has been written in three scripts: Arabic until 1929, Latin from 1929 to 1940 and Cyrillic since, with a new Latin alphabet now planned.
- The tenge sign was adopted in 2007; before that, prices were written with the word теңге or the abbreviation тг.
- Almaty takes its name from алма, apple: the wild apple forests of the hills around the city are where the domestic apple comes from.
- Where Turkish says üç (three), yol (road) and yıl (year), Kazakh says үш, жол and жыл.
Questions people ask
8How many letters are in the Kazakh alphabet?
42, including nine letters that are Kazakh's own: Ә, Ғ, Қ, Ң, Ө, Ұ, Ү, Һ and І.
What is the Kazakh alphabet in order?
А Ә Б В Г Ғ Д Е Ё Ж З И Й К Қ Л М Н Ң О Ө П Р С Т У Ұ Ү Ф Х Һ Ц Ч Ш Щ Ъ Ы І Ь Э Ю Я.
What is the difference between the Kazakh and Russian alphabets?
Kazakh has 42 letters and Russian has 33. Nine Kazakh letters, Ә ә, Ғ ғ, Қ қ, Ң ң, Ө ө, Ұ ұ, Ү ү, Һ һ and І і, write Kazakh sounds such as the ng of Ң and the front vowels Ә, Ө, Ү and І. Russian does not use them.
How do I type Kazakh letters on a keyboard?
Add the Kazakh keyboard layout (Windows Settings › Language & region, macOS Keyboard › Input Sources, or a phone keyboard app such as Gboard). Without one, copy the letters from this page or type their codes with AltX in Word, for example 049B then AltX for қ.
Is Kazakh written in Latin or Cyrillic?
Cyrillic, since 1940, and that is still the everyday script in Kazakhstan. The current Latin-alphabet draft has not yet been approved, and the switch is planned to be gradual. Kazakhs in China use an Arabic-based alphabet.
Is the Kazakh language the same as Russian?
No. Kazakh is a Turkic language, related to Kyrgyz, Tatar, Uzbek and Turkish, and unrelated to Russian. It borrowed the Cyrillic alphabet and many words from Russian, and most people in Kazakhstan speak both.
What is the Kazakhstan currency symbol?
, the tenge sign , written after the amount: 1 000 .
Where is the Kazakh language spoken?
Mainly in Kazakhstan, where it is the state language, and in Kazakh communities in China, Uzbekistan, Russia and Mongolia. CLDR's estimate for Kazakhstan is about 13 million Kazakh speakers.
