Script guide › Arabic Script
How to recognize Arabic
Arabic is one of 5 languages in Grafle's Arabic Script group. Here's what it looks like, where you'll see it on signs, and how to tell it apart from its lookalikes.
Spot it fast
- The article ال (alif-lam) starts words constantly.
- Never has پ, چ, گ or ژ — those extra letters mean Persian, Urdu or Kurdish.
What Arabic looks like
يولد جميع الناس أحراراً متساوين في الكرامة.
مرحبا بك في العالم العربي.
الشمس تشرق من الشرق.
Arabic Script scripts: Flowing right-to-left script where letters connect like cursive; dots above and below distinguish letters.
Where you'll see it on signs
- Saudi Arabia
- Egypt
- Iraq
- Morocco
- United Arab Emirates
- Algeria
- Syria
- Jordan
- Yemen
- Libya
- Sudan
- Oman
- Qatar
- Kuwait
- Tunisia
- Lebanon
- Mauritania
- Bahrain
- Djibouti
- Comoros
- Somalia
- Chad
- West Bank
Easy to confuse with
- Persian (Farsi) — Persian has four letters Arabic lacks: پ چ ژ گ. Arabic's tell is the constant ال (alif-lam) article.
- Urdu — Urdu slopes diagonally (nastaliq) with the wide ے; Arabic sits on a flat baseline with ال starting words everywhere.
- Pashto — Pashto adds ring-and-dot letters like ټ, ښ, ږ, څ that never appear in Arabic.
- Kurdish (Sorani) — Sorani writes every vowel — ە, ۆ and ێ appear constantly — and drops Arabic's ال article.