ཆ + ◌ུ
ཆུ
Alphabets
The Tibetan alphabet ཀ་ཁ
Meet every letter of Tibetan, hear how it sounds, and learn how letters join to make words.
About Tibetan
Tibetan is written in the Tibetan script from left to right, hanging from a headline. Its 30 consonants are learnt in rows of four, the ka kha. Each consonant carries a built-in "a"; the four vowel signs ི ུ ེ ོ change it. A syllable can have a root letter with letters above, below, before and after it, and many of these are silent in modern speech.
- 30
- consonants
- 4
- vowel signs
- ་
- tsheg between syllables
- L → R
- writing direction
Vowels དབྱངས
Every consonant carries "a". Four vowel signs change it – shown here on ཀ.
Consonants གསལ་བྱེད
The consonants are arranged by where in the mouth the sound is made. Tap a letter to hear it.
Row 1 ཀ ཁ ག ང
ka kha ga nga
Row 2 ཅ ཆ ཇ ཉ
ca cha ja nya
Row 3 ཏ ཐ ད ན
ta tha da na
Row 4 པ ཕ བ མ
pa pha ba ma
Row 5 ཙ ཚ ཛ ཝ
tsa tsha dza wa
Row 6 ཞ ཟ འ ཡ
zha za 'a ya
Row 7 ར ལ ཤ ས
ra la sha sa
Row 8 ཧ ཨ
ha a
Subjoined letters འདོགས་ཅན
stacked under the root letter – Ctrl or Alt on the keyboard
The tsheg ་ separates syllables and the shad ། ends a phrase.
How letters join to make words
Tibetan words are built syllable by syllable. Three simple rules cover almost everything.
-
1
Consonant + vowel sign
A vowel sign sits above or below the consonant.
ཀ +◌ི =ཀི -
2
Stack a letter
A subjoined letter goes under the root letter.
ཀ +◌ྲ =ཀྲ -
3
Tsheg between syllables
Each syllable ends with a dot.
བོད +་ +ཡིག =བོད་ཡིག
Build real words
མ + ◌ི
མི
བ + ◌ོ
བོ
+
ད
Ready to type in Tibetan?
Use the on-screen keyboard to write these letters, or translate your first sentence.