Punjabi Alphabet & Letters

Punjabi has two scripts. In India and among most Sikhs worldwide it is written in Gurmukhi (ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ, "from the mouth of the Guru"); in Pakistan, where most Punjabi speakers live, it is written in Shahmukhi, a form of the Perso-Arabic script, which has its own pages under Punjabi (Arabic) and Western Panjabi. Sikh tradition credits the second Guru, Guru Angad, with shaping Gurmukhi in the 16th century. Like Devanagari it hangs from a headline and reads left to right; there are no capital and small letters.

The traditional Punjabi alphabet is the painti (ਪੈਂਤੀ, "thirty-five"), recited in seven rows of five. It opens with the three vowel carriers ੳ ਅ ੲ and ਸ ਹ, then runs ਕ ਖ ਗ ਘ ਙ, ਚ ਛ ਜ ਝ ਞ, ਟ ਠ ਡ ਢ ਣ, ਤ ਥ ਦ ਧ ਨ, ਪ ਫ ਬ ਭ ਮ, and ends with ਯ ਰ ਲ ਵ ੜ. The last letter, ੜ (ṛ), is Punjabi's flapped r, heard in ਘੋੜਾ (horse) and ਪੜ੍ਹਨਾ (to read).

Six more letters carry a dot at the foot, the pairin bindi (nukta ਼): ਸ਼ (sh, ਸ਼ਹਿਰ city), ਖ਼ (kh as in Bach, ਖ਼ਬਰ news), ਗ਼ (ġ, ਗ਼ਰੀਬ poor), ਜ਼ (z, ਜ਼ਿੰਦਗੀ life), ਫ਼ (f, ਫ਼ੋਨ phone) and ਲ਼ (a retroflex l, ਕਾਲ਼ਾ black). With them the alphabet is often taught as 41 letters; some charts stop at 35, others add rarer forms, which is why the question of how many letters Gurmukhi has gets several answers. Casual writers often leave the dots off. Typed text often stores ਸ਼ as two characters, ਸ followed by ਼; Unicode treats both as the same letter and they look identical.

Punjabi matras, tippi, bindi and addak

Gurmukhi is an abugida: every consonant carries an inherent schwa /ə/, so ਕ is kə. Other vowels are signs called lagan matra: ਕਾ kā (kanna ਾ), ਕਿ ki (sihari ਿ), ਕੀ kī (bihari ੀ), ਕੁ ku (aunkar ੁ), ਕੂ kū (dulainkar ੂ), ਕੇ ke (lanvan ੇ), ਕੈ kai (dulavan ੈ), ਕੋ ko (hora ੋ) and ਕੌ kau (kanaura ੌ). The inherent schwa /ə/ with no vowel sign is called mukta. Sihari ਿ is written before the consonant but typed and said after it. When a word begins with a vowel, the matra sits on a carrier instead: ੳ carries ਉ ਊ ਓ, ਅ carries ਅ ਆ ਐ ਔ, and ੲ carries ਇ ਈ ਏ.

Two marks make a sound nasal. The tippi ੰ goes with the short vowels (mukta, sihari, aunkar) and with the dependent long-ū sign dulainkar: ਪੰਜਾਬ, ਮੁੰਡਾ, ਤਿੰਨ, ਮੂੰਹ. The bindi ਂ goes with the others: ਮੈਂ (I), ਨਹੀਂ (no), ਹਾਂ (yes), ਪੈਂਤੀ. The addak ੱ doubles the consonant after it, and it changes meaning: ਪਤਾ (patā, known, an address) against ਪੱਤਾ (pattā, a leaf). In Unicode you type the addak right after the letter it sits on, before the consonant it doubles: ਪ ੱ ਤ ਾ.

Three letters can be written small at the foot of the one before, as pairin letters: ਰ in ਪ੍ਰੀਤ (love) and ਸ੍ਰੀ, ਹ in ਪੜ੍ਹਨਾ and ਚੜ੍ਹਦੀ, and, more rarely, ਵ. You type them with the virama (halant) ੍: ਪ + ੍ + ਰ gives ਪ੍ਰ; your font draws the small form. Everyday Punjabi rarely stacks other consonants; it doubles them with the addak instead.

Punjabi is one of the few tonal languages in the Indo-European family, and the spelling shows it. The letters ਘ ਝ ਢ ਧ ਭ are no longer said with a breathy gh, jh, ḍh, dh, bh: at the start of a word they turn into k, c, ṭ, t, p with a low tone, and a ਹ inside a word marks a tone too. So ਕੋੜਾ (koṛā, whip) and ਘੋੜਾ (horse, said kòṛā with a low tone) differ only in pitch.

Ik Onkar, Gurbani signs, Punjabi punctuation and Gurmukhi numbers

ੴ (Ik Onkar, "One Creator") opens the Mul Mantar, the first line of the Guru Granth Sahib. It resembles the digit ੧ followed by a sign based on ੳ, with a long upper tail, and it has its own Unicode character, U+0A74. Sikh scripture, Gurbani, also uses a few signs uncommon in everyday Punjabi: the old nasal adak bindi ਁ, the visarga ਃ, and the udaat ੑ and yakash ੵ, which appear in some editions of the scripture. They are here so that Gurbani text copies cleanly.

Punjabi ends a sentence with the danda ।, the same character Hindi uses: ਮੈਂ ਘਰ ਜਾ ਰਿਹਾ ਹਾਂ। The double danda ॥ closes a verse and is everywhere in Gurbani, often around a number: ॥੧॥. Commas, question and exclamation marks and quotation marks are the ordinary ones. The abbreviation sign ੶ was added to Unicode for shortened words such as titles, but most writers simply use a full stop. Please do not use the vertical bar | for the danda: it looks close, but search, screen readers and line breaking treat it as a different character.

Gurmukhi numbers are ੦ ੧ ੨ ੩ ੪ ੫ ੬ ੭ ੮ ੯, counted ਇੱਕ ਦੋ ਤਿੰਨ ਚਾਰ ਪੰਜ ਛੇ ਸੱਤ ਅੱਠ ਨੌਂ ਦਸ, and ten is written ੧੦. They are used in Gurbani, on gurdwara notices and in school counting charts, while newspapers and phones mostly show 0–9. Gurmukhi has been in Unicode since 1991, in the block U+0A00–U+0A7F.

How to type Punjabi on a keyboard, in MS Word and on a phone

Windows: Settings → Time & language → Language & region → Add a language → Punjabi (Gurmukhi). The standard Punjabi keyboard is the InScript layout, one key per letter, the same arrangement as the Hindi keyboard; recent Windows versions also offer a phonetic keyboard that turns Latin typing into Gurmukhi. Switch with Windows + Space. In MS Word use a Unicode font that supports Gurmukhi, such as Nirmala UI, which ships with Windows; Raavi is listed under Gurmukhi Supplemental Fonts. The English (India) layout gives ₹ with Right Alt + 4.

Mac: System Settings → Keyboard → Input Sources → add Gurmukhi (InScript) or Gurmukhi – QWERTY, which puts letters on the keys whose English sound they match. iPhone: Settings → General → Keyboard → Keyboards → Add New Keyboard → Punjabi. Android: in Gboard or SwiftKey add Punjabi; the transliteration option lets you type sat sri akal and pick ਸਤਿ ਸ੍ਰੀ ਅਕਾਲ. WhatsApp and Instagram use whichever keyboard your phone has.

Old fonts: many Gurbani websites, typing courses and office files still use pre-Unicode fonts such as AnmolLipi, GurbaniAkhar and Asees, which draw Gurmukhi shapes over Latin letters. Pasted anywhere else, such text turns into a jumble of Latin letters; use a converter or retype it in Unicode, the kind on this page, which pastes correctly anywhere. In HTML the danda is ।, ॥ is ॥, ੴ is ੴ and ₹ is ₹.

Where Punjabi is spoken, and Punjabi next to Hindi

Punjabi is the language of the Punjab, the "land of five waters" between the Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas and Sutlej, divided between India and Pakistan in 1947. In India, Punjabi in Gurmukhi is the official language of the state of Punjab, an additional official language in Delhi and Haryana, and one of the 22 languages of the constitution's Eighth Schedule. CLDR estimates about 43 million people use Punjabi in Gurmukhi, around 39 million of them in India; in Pakistan Punjabi is the most widely spoken language, written in Shahmukhi.

Emigration has carried Punjabi across the world. CLDR estimates about 2.5 million Punjabi users in the United Kingdom, 1 million in Canada, 9,900 in Kenya and 24,000 in Singapore; large Punjabi communities also live in the United States and Australia. Southall in London, Birmingham, Brampton near Toronto and Surrey in British Columbia are places with large Punjabi communities, where Gurmukhi can be seen on shop signs and gurdwara boards.

People searching for the Punjabi alphabet with Hindi usually want to see the two scripts side by side. Gurmukhi and Devanagari descend from the same Brahmi family and follow the same order of sounds, so most letters pair off: ਕ is क, ਮ is म, ਨ is न, and the matras work the same way. Spoken Punjabi and Hindi share many words but are separate languages, Punjabi with its tones, its ੜ and its doubled consonants; Hindi has its own Hindi alphabet page, and the neighbouring Urdu and Saraiki pages cover the Shahmukhi side of the region.