Persian alphabet
The Persian alphabet is the Persian script: 32 letters. 32 letters — an abjad: short vowels are not written, words run right to left, and four letters were invented by the language itself. The characters are grouped: ا آ و ی — the vowels and length, پ چ ژ گ — four letters the script invented for itself, ب ت ث — one skeleton, dots count to three. Below is a table with sound and a breakdown by groups.
All 32 letters in one list
ا, و, ی, پ, چ, ژ, گ, ب, ت, ث, ج, ح, خ, د, ذ, ر, ز, س, ش, ص, ض, ط, ظ, ع, غ, ف, ق, ک, ل, م, ن, ه
The tables on this page also include آ: this character is needed for reading but does not count as a letter of the alphabet.
ا آ و ی — the vowels and length
The script is an abjad: short vowels are not written in it at all. کتاب is "k-t-â-b", and it reads ketâb — the short e comes from memory. Only the long ones are written, with these signs, plus the seat a word starts on when it opens with any vowel. Vav and ye stay consonants ("v" and "y") whenever a vowel of their own stands next to them.
پ چ ژ گ — four letters the script invented for itself
The script this writing descends from had no "p", "ch", "zh" or "g" — so the language added dots to ready-made skeletons. This is the first thing that gives a text away on sight. It is also the easiest four of the alphabet: each letter sounds exactly as labelled.
ب ت ث — one skeleton, dots count to three
The most legible family: one skeleton, and the difference is the number of dots. One underneath, two on top, three on top. Learn it first — here you can see how the whole writing system works. The third letter lives only in bookish loanwords.
ج ح خ — j and two h sounds
One skeleton, three letters, told apart by a dot. The dot inside makes "j"; no dot leaves a breathy h; a dot on top gives kh, deeper and rougher. The two h sounds must not be confused: حالا is "now", and خالا is already not a word but a typo.
د ذ ر ز — tails with no beginning
Letters that join only from the right and so never change shape inside a word. Each pair shares one skeleton: an angle, and a stick with a tail. The second letter of the pair carries the dot (or three). The same trick as the family above — one skeleton, the dot decides.
س ش — the three teeth
The most conspicuous letter of the script: three teeth in a row. Dotless it is "s", with three dots on top "sh". A pair on one skeleton, like the angles above.
ص ض ط ظ — old spellings on living words
Four "heavy" consonants of the older alphabet. Their special pronunciation faded centuries ago. Today ص reads as plain s, ض as z, ط as t, ظ as z — three signs share the one z sound. They live in bookish loanwords, but there is no skipping them: صبح "morning" opens every day.
ع غ ق — the throat and the depth
Ayn here has almost gone mute: it reads as a broken-off vowel or not at all. Ghayn went the other way and found a voice — a deep gargled g. And ق is a sound made down in the throat, between "k" and "g"; the transcription writes it as "g".
ف ک گ ل م ن ه — the light consonants
Consonants with skeletons of their own that nothing can be confused with. ک and گ differ from ق in depth: ک is an ordinary k, ق sounds from the throat. And the third h of the script: ه is a plain breath of air, the quietest one.
What to know about this script
There are 33 signs: 32 letters, plus alef with madda — the same ا stretched by a wave, which textbooks do not count. The order of the table is not the alphabetical one — it goes by families instead. First come the letters the script invented for itself, then the skeletons and their dots. Short vowels can be written with harakat, small strokes above and below the line. Living text does not carry them: you read by the consonant skeletons. In the first weeks the transcription does the reading for you. One more habit of this script is the half-space. A word like میخواهم is written in two halves joined by an invisible gap; on screen it is still one word. The numerals are Eastern (۰۱۲۳…) and look different from the digits you are used to.
Where this script came from and why it looks the way it does
Four letters of the Persian alphabet — p, ch, zh and g — were invented by the Persians themselves: the Arabic script they grew out of had no such sounds, so dots were added to existing letters to make them.
Test yourself
Five characters at random. No need to answer aloud — just pick; the answer appears at once.
- Which character reads as “aa (long)”?
A vertical stroke. At the head of a word it often carries the madda wave (آ) or a hamza (أ، إ)
- Which character reads as “y / ee”?
Two dots underneath. In mid-word it becomes a small zigzag on a spine
- Which character reads as “zh”?
The z tail with three dots on top. A rare letter: it lives in loanwords, like the local word for jacket, and in the word for "special"
- Which character reads as “t”?
The same skeleton, two dots on top. تهران begins with it, and so does every second name of the capital
- Which character reads as “h (breathy)”?
The skeleton without a single dot. The pair of ج and خ: the same shape, the dots decide
How to learn letters so they stay
You cannot learn a table by staring at it. What works: see a character, try to recall its sound, get it wrong, see the right answer — and come back to that character in a day, not in an hour.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- It is better to test yourself the next day than at the end of the same session. That is why a word comes back to you tomorrow.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · g = 0.82 when tested a day or two later, against 0.56 on the same day.
- Studying a little every day gets more into your head than spending the same total time in one sitting.checked many timesDonovan & Radosevich, 1999, Journal of Applied Psychology 84(5) · 63 studies compared, difference d = 0.46 — a sizeable figure for a learning effect.
That is why the alphabet in the app is learned a few characters at a time, not all at once: nobody holds 32 signs in one sitting.
Frequently asked
How many letters in the Persian alphabet?
32 letters — Persian script: ا, و, ی, پ, چ, ژ, گ, ب, ت, ث, ج, ح, خ, د, ذ, ر, ز, س, ش, ص, ض, ط, ظ, ع, غ, ف, ق, ک, ل, م, ن, ه. The tables on this page also include آ: this character is needed for reading but does not count as a letter of the alphabet. There are no capital and small forms: the character is written the same way everywhere.
Can I listen to how the Persian letters sound?
Not yet: we have no recordings for this script. That is why there is no sound button either — it would be silent.
How long does it take to learn the Persian alphabet?
A few characters a day — one to two weeks, if you come back to what you covered. The whole alphabet crammed in an evening is remembered for an evening: without reviews the next day and three days later, the characters are almost entirely gone.
Where to start: letters or words?
With the letters. A word in an unfamiliar script cannot be read at all, and a word card tells you no more than a picture.