Arabic, Persian, Urdu: which keyboard to choose?

At a glance: Arabic Keyboard

• Keyboard: Arabic Keyboard (لوحة المفاتيح العربية), Arabic script, Middle East & North Africa.
• Direction right to left; 34 keys and 55 characters across all layers.
• Engine: 74 transliteration rules — the examples below come straight from it.
• This guide: 3 method steps and 1 answered questions.
• Typefaces: Scheherazade New, Amiri, Noto Naskh Arabic, Noto Sans Arabic.
• Search and export: Google, YouTube, Wikipedia, Translate, DuckDuckGo.

Common mistakes to avoid

Nine times out of ten, a Arabic Keyboard problem is one of these — each takes five seconds to fix. Work through them in order before assuming the keyboard is broken.

• Nothing converts, not even « marhaban » → « مرحبا »: check that Transliteration mode (not the physical keyboard) is on, and that you type plain lowercase Latin letters.
• Text looks reversed after paste: paste without formatting (Ctrl+Shift+V) to keep the right to left order intact.
• Unexpected layout: the Harakat variant changes the keys — switch back to the standard variant if anything surprises you.
• Clusters split after paste (Arabic, Indic and Southeast Asian scripts): paste into this editor first and re-copy — it normalizes the Unicode shaping that Word and chats sometimes break.

Try these conversions now

Copy each left-hand transcription into the keyboard linked above and confirm the script on the right. Six quick wins that calibrate your fingers to the engine.

• Type “marhaban” → get مرحبا.
• Type “marhaba” → get مرحبا.
• Type “salam” → get سلام.
• Type “salaam” → get سلام.
• Type “shukran” → get شكرا.
• Type “kayf” → get كيف.

The exact rules behind the examples

The walkthrough above uses a handful of conversions. Here is the complete engine behind this guide — all 74 mappings of the Arabic Keyboard, longest match first. Find the transcription you need, then try it live in the keyboard linked at the top of this page.

More questions about this keyboard

• Is the Arabic keyboard free? — Yes, it is 100% free with no installation and no account required.
• How do I type ta marbuta or hamza? — Use the AltGr layer: keys display diacritics and Arabic supplementary characters. In phonetic mode type “at” for ة.
• Do arabizi digits (7, 3, 9) work? — Yes: 7 → ح, 3 → ع, 9 → ق, 5 → خ, following the Arabizi chat convention.
• How do I add harakat (vowel marks)? — Open the Harakat variant, then use Shift plus a letter key to add fatha, damma, kasra or shadda.
• Can I use it on mobile? — Yes, the virtual keyboard is fully touch-optimized and the editor switches to right-to-left automatically.
• How do I paste Arabic into Word or WhatsApp? — Copy from our editor (already RTL) and paste into Word, Google Docs or WhatsApp — direction is preserved.

Neighbouring keyboards

The same method often applies to neighbouring languages. Each of these has its own full keyboard page with virtual keys, engine and dictionaries.

• Hebrew Keyboard: Type Hebrew right-to-left with smart transliteration or the virtual keyboard, including niqqud on the Shift layer.…
• Persian (Farsi) Keyboard: Clavier persan en ligne : écrivez en farsi (فارسی) avec translittération phonétique instantanée.…
• Urdu Keyboard: Clavier ourdou en ligne : tapez اردو avec un clavier virtuel complet et translittération phonétique.…
• Amharic Keyboard: Clavier amharique (Ge'ez) en ligne : écrivez አማርኛ avec le fidèle éthiopien et translittération phonétique.…
• Syriac Keyboard: Clavier syriaque (aramaïque) en ligne pour écrire ܣܘܪܝܬ sans installation.…
• Yiddish Keyboard: Clavier yiddish en ligne : écrivez ייִדיש avec translittération (sholem → שלום, ey → ײ).…

All method guides

Twelve guides cover the most requested scripts. Pick yours — every guide embeds its keyboard, so you can practise each step immediately.

• Type Arabic without an Arabic keyboard: complete guide: Type “marhaba” and get مرحبا: transliteration, harakat, copy-paste and virtual keyboard.…
• Type Russian on a French/English keyboard: easy method: “privet” becomes привет: JCUKEN transliteration, Ё key and Russian physical layout.…
• Type Hebrew with vowels (niqqud) online: “shalom” → שלום, Shift layer for vowels: Hebrew RTL keyboard guide.…
• Type Chinese with pinyin: how-to: Type “ni hao” and pick 你好: tones, simplified/traditional and pinyin keyboard.…
• Type Japanese: romaji → hiragana, katakana, kanji: “konnichiwa” → こんにちは: romaji engine, kana keyboard and vocabulary resources.…
• Type Korean (Hangul): automatic composition: “annyeong” → 안녕: jamos combine into syllables in real time.…
• Type Hindi (Devanagari): transliteration guide: “namaste” → नमस्ते: matras, conjuncts and Devanagari keyboard.…
• Type Vietnamese: Telex, VNI and tones: “xin chao” + s → xin chào: Telex, VNI modes and Vietnamese keyboard.…
• Type Greek: modern and polytonic: “kalimera” → καλημέρα: transliteration, tonos and Greek keyboard.…
• Spanish, German, Italian accents without a local keyboard: “como estas” → ¿Cómo estás?, “gruesse” → grüße: accent autocorrection.…
• Online dictionaries by language: the Lexilogos-like hub: Each keyboard embeds its hub: monolingual, bilingual, grammar, press and resources.…