ਪੰਜਾਬੀਆپنجابیاPunjabia

ਮਾਂ-ਬੋਲੀ · ماں بولی · mā̃-bolī · the mother tongue

ਬੋਲੀبولیLanguage

A language is not just how a people speak. It is how they remember. Inside Punjabi live nine centuries of poetry, the prayers of three faiths, the jokes of ten thousand villages, and the exact shade of feeling in a mother's blessing. Learn the words, and the rest begins returning with them.

Meet today's word Start from the first letter

Wherever you begin — from zero, from half-remembered kitchen Punjabi, or from fluency looking for its literature — the path below runs in one direction: ਅੱਖਰ · اکھر akkhar, letter, then word, then verse.

Why Punjabi matters

The language is the archive. Everything else is stored inside it.

History can be read about in any language. But Punjab can only be heard in one.

Punjabi is among the most widely spoken languages on earth — the mother tongue of well over a hundred million people across Pakistani Punjab, Indian Punjab, and a diaspora that reaches every continent. Its literary record begins with the verses of Baba Farid in the twelfth century, runs through the Guru Granth Sahib and the Sufi poets, crests in the qisse of Waris Shah, and continues today in film, hip-hop, and the fields.

And yet many of its children can speak it but not read it — or understand it but not speak it — because the language arrived in the diaspora as sound alone, cut off from its scripts. This section exists to reconnect the sound to the letter, the letter to the literature, and the literature to you.

~150Mspeakers worldwide — estimates vary
2scripts · one tongue
9centuries of literature

Choose your script — or take both

One tongue, two hands

Punjabi is written in two scripts. Gurmukhi carries it in Indian Punjab and most of the Sikh world; Shahmukhi carries it in Pakistani Punjab, home to the majority of all Punjabi speakers. Neither is more Punjabi than the other. They are the same language held in two hands — and on Punjabia, every word is given in both.

Gurmukhi

ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ

"From the mouth of the Guru." An abugida written left to right, in which every vowel is written down. Its thirty-five core letters — the painti — are traditionally associated with Guru Angad in the sixteenth century, standardising older Punjabi mercantile scripts. What you see is what you say: Gurmukhi spelling is famously faithful to sound.

  • Direction left → right
  • Vowels always written
  • Letters 35 core + 6 extended
  • Where Indian Punjab · Sikh diaspora
  • Best first script if your family reads it, or you want the quickest path to reading

Shahmukhi

شاہ مُکھی

"From the mouth of the King." A Perso-Arabic script written right to left, in the calligraphic Nastaliq style. Letters join and change shape by position, and short vowels usually go unwritten — you learn to supply them, as readers of Urdu, Persian, and Arabic do. Most of classical Punjabi literature, including the great qisse, circulated first in Shahmukhi.

  • Direction right → left
  • Vowels short vowels usually unwritten
  • Letters ~38, joining by position
  • Where Pakistani Punjab — the majority of speakers
  • Best first script if you already read Urdu or Arabic, or your family's Punjab is west of the border
ਸਾਂਝسانجھ
sā̃jh — "the bond of things shared." The same word, the same sound, two scripts. On this site the two always travel together.

How the one language ended up with two scripts — and how 1947 made each half of Punjab unreadable to the other — is a story of its own: Gurmukhi & Shahmukhi — one tongue, two scripts. Below, each script gets a full learning journey. Take one now and the other later; the sounds you learn transfer completely.

Learning journey · ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ

Learn Gurmukhi

Six stages, from your first letter to your first poem. Gurmukhi is one of the most learnable scripts in the world — regular, phonetic, and complete. Most learners read their first words within a week.

~10 minutesorientation

How Gurmukhi thinks

Before the letters, the logic. Every consonant letter carries a built-in a sound: ਕ alone reads ka, ਰ reads ra. Vowel marks bend that sound — ਕਾ kā, ਕੀ kī, ਕੂ kū. There are no capital letters, no silent letters, and almost no irregular spellings. If you can say it, you can spell it; if you can spell it, you can say it.

~1–2 weeks of short sessionsthe alphabet

The painti — thirty-five letters, five at a time

Gurmukhi's letters come in tidy rows of five, grouped by where the tongue makes the sound — throat, palate, teeth, lips. Learn one row a day and the painti is yours in a week. Tap any letter to hear how it behaves, see its name, and meet a real word that uses it.

~1 weekvowels & marks

The ten vowels — lagā̃ mātrā̃

Ten vowel sounds, ten marks. Watch them all land on the letter ਸ (s):

The three letters ੳ, ਅ, ੲ exist to carry vowels at the start of a word: ਉ ਊ ਓ ride on ੳ; ਅ ਆ ਐ ਔ on ਅ; ਇ ਈ ਏ on ੲ.
MarkNameSoundOn ਸAs in
—muktāaਸ sathe a in "about"
ਾkannāāਸਾ sāthe a in "father"
ਿsihārīiਸਿ sithe i in "sit" — written before the letter, said after
ੀbihārīīਸੀ sīthe ee in "seen"
ੁauṅkaṛuਸੁ suthe u in "put"
ੂdulaiṅkaṛūਸੂ sūthe oo in "moon"
ੇlāvā̃eਸੇ sethe ay in "say" (pure, no glide)
ੈdulāvā̃aiਸੈ saithe a in "man" (roughly)
ੋhoṛāoਸੋ sothe o in "go" (pure)
ੌkanauṛāauਸੌ sauthe au in "caught" (roughly)

Three small marks finish the toolkit: bindī and ṭippī put the sound through the nose, and addhak doubles the consonant after it.

  • 10 vowel signs
  • 3 vowel-bearer letters
  • Nasalisation: bindī & ṭippī
  • Doubling: addhak
  • Subjoined letters (੍ਹ ੍ਰ ੍ਵ) — guide in preparation

~2 weeksfirst words

First words, first sentences

Now the letters start paying rent. Sound out real words — every beginner word in our archive shows its Gurmukhi in large type, with pronunciation and a sentence to read:

ਮਾਂ ਦੀ ਬੋਲੀ ਮਿੱਠੀ ਹੁੰਦੀ ਹੈ।

mā̃ dī bolī miṭṭhī hundī hai

"A mother's tongue is sweet." — five words, and you can already read three of them: ਮਾਂ (mā̃), ਦੀ (dī), ਬੋਲੀ (bolī).

ongoingreal reading

Read the real thing

The fastest route from "sounding out" to "reading" is real literature with help alongside. Start in the reading library with transliteration switched on; graduate to switching it off. The Parallel Reader was built for exactly this moment.

ongoingwriting

Write it by hand

Writing locks reading in. Gurmukhi letters hang from the headline stroke rather than sitting on a baseline — write the letter first, then the line. Printable stroke-order worksheets and guided writing practice are in preparation for a future update.

Learning journey · شاہ مُکھی

Learn Shahmukhi

The same six-stage philosophy, adapted to a script that works differently: right to left, letters that join hands, and vowels you learn to hear rather than see. If you know Gurmukhi already, stage 2's letter-bridge will feel like meeting old friends in new clothes.

~10 minutesorientation

How Shahmukhi thinks

Shahmukhi is Punjabi written with the Perso-Arabic toolkit, flowing right to left in the Nastaliq hand. Two ideas carry you a long way. First: letters connect, and change shape depending on whether they begin, continue, or end a word — like cursive English, but systematic. Second: it is an abjad — short vowels are usually left out. You read صبر and supply the vowels because you know the word is sabar. Every fluent reader of Urdu or Arabic does this without thinking; you will too.

~2–3 weeks of short sessionsthe letters

The letters — with their Gurmukhi twins

Tap any letter to see its name, its sound — and which Gurmukhi letter says the same thing. Notice something Gurmukhi readers find strange: several Shahmukhi letters share one sound (ث س ص are all s). The spelling remembers where a word came from — Arabic, Persian, or Punjabi soil — even when the mouth has stopped making the difference.

~1–2 weeksjoining forms

Letters that join hands

Each letter has up to four shapes: alone, starting, middle, and ending. The skeleton stays the same — you're learning handwriting variations, not new letters. Watch ب (be) move through three real words:

A handful of letters (ا د ڈ ذ ر ڑ ز ژ و) are loners — they never connect forward, which is why words sometimes have gaps inside them.
PositionShapeIn a wordReading
Beginningبـبولیbolī — language
Middleـبـصبرsabar — patience
Endـبربrabb — God

~2 weeksvowels & marks

Hearing the missing vowels

Long vowels are written with full letters: ا for ā, و for o/ū, ی for ī/e. Short vowels use small optional marks — zabar (a), zer (i), pesh (u) — which children's books print and adult text leaves out. Two marks matter enormously for Punjabi: ں (nūn ghunnā) nasalises like Gurmukhi's bindī, and ھ (do-chashmī he) marks aspiration — it is what turns ب b into بھ bh, so بھج reads bhajj.

  • Long vowels: ا و ی ے
  • Short-vowel marks: zabar, zer, pesh
  • Nasalisation: ں
  • Aspiration: ھ
  • Punjabi-specific letters (ݨ for ṇ) — guide in preparation

ongoingreal reading

Read the real thing

Every reading on Punjabia can be switched to Shahmukhi with one tap — the Parallel Reader, the Word of the Day, the whole archive. Waris Shah's Heer, whose author wrote in this script, is waiting for you in it.

ongoingthe bridge

Become bi-scriptal

The quiet superpower: reading both scripts makes the whole of Punjabi literature yours — the Gurbani and the qisse, Amrita Pritam and Ustad Daman, both halves of the divided library. Every word pair on this site is a flashcard for exactly that. There is no better small act of stitching Punjab back together.

ਅੱਜ ਦਾ ਸ਼ਬਦ · اج دا شبد · the daily ritual

Word of the day

One word, taken apart with care, every day — script, sound, story, and the sentence to use it in. Come back tomorrow; the archive keeps every word you've met.

Today's word

ਵਤਨ وطن

watan

/ʋə·t̪ən/ — "vuh-tun"

Far more than a country on a map — the specific earth you come from, and the belonging that comes with it. Usually carried on a current of longing.

noun (masculine) · homeland

Literal
Homeland; one's native land or place of belonging.
Origin
From Arabic waṭan (وطن), borrowed through Persian into Punjabi, Urdu, and much of the Persianate world.
In a sentence
ਮੈਨੂੰ ਆਪਣਾ ਵਤਨ ਯਾਦ ਆਉਂਦਾ ਹੈ।
مینوں اپنا وطن یاد آؤندا ہے۔
mainū̃ āpṇā watan yād āundā hai — "I miss my homeland."
Cultural note
The word the diaspora reaches for. In song and verse, watan is what the soldier, the migrant, and the exile all dream of returning to.
Related
ਦੇਸ · دیس · des — countryਪਰਦੇਸ · پردیس · pardes — foreign land
Browse the word archive

Every word you've met — and the ones waiting

The word archive

Search in any script — Punjabi, English, or transliteration. Filter by theme or difficulty. Tap a word to open its full study.

Theme
Level

People learn languages by reading them

The reading library

Real Punjabi, shelved by how much help you'll want beside you. Every reading gives the original in both scripts, a translation, and vocabulary you can tap. Start on the first shelf; the library grows with every update.

First readings

single words & sentences
Word of the day One word daily, fully unpacked — the gentlest possible reading habit. 1 min · daily Word studies — ਵਤਨ & ਇਸ਼ਕ Two words taken apart at full depth: homeland, and love with consequences. 8 min · both scripts Proverbs in the archive Akhāṇ — field-tested wisdom one sentence long. Filter the archive by "virtue" and read the example sentences aloud. 2 min each

Growing confidence

verses with help alongside
Bulleh Shah — Bullā kī jāṇā The kafi that refuses every label, stanza by stanza: original, transliteration, literal and natural translation, and the Sufi context under each verse. 15 min · lyric explorer The same words, twice Read one passage in both scripts side by side — the fastest bridge exercise there is. 10 min · both scripts

Full texts

the literature itself
Heer — Waris Shah, 1766 · the Parallel Reader The opening of Punjab's greatest qissa in an annotated, tap-every-word edition. Original and English side by side; save the words you don't know. 20 min · interactive Tere Ishq Nachaya — Bulleh Shah · the Parallel Reader The great Sufi kafi of love as a dance the lover cannot refuse, in the same annotated, tap-every-word edition — Gurmukhi or Shahmukhi beside the English. 8 min · interactive Sohni Mahiwal · Mirza Sahiban · Sassi Punnun The other great romances, in the same annotated edition — the Parallel Reader is built to hold them all. in preparation Folk tales & children's stories Prose shelves for gentler long-form reading — including Dulla Bhatti, told for young readers. in preparation

A Punjabia signature

The Parallel Reader

Reading literature in a language you're learning usually means two books, three tabs, and a dictionary. The Parallel Reader folds them into one page: the original verse on the left, a faithful English translation on the right, and every single word tappable — meaning, both scripts, transliteration, and a note on what the poet is doing.

  • Switch the original between Gurmukhi and Shahmukhi, mid-sentence
  • Show or hide transliteration and translation as you improve
  • Tap any word for its meaning — save it to your personal vocabulary list
  • Poetic and historical annotations under every stanza
Open Heer — Waris Shah, 1766

How the machine works

Grammar, gently

Six short guides — enough to make sense of every sentence on this page. Open what you need; skip what you don't. Deeper guides join this shelf with future updates.

01 Word order — the verb comes home last open

Punjabi sentences run subject → object → verb. English says "the boy eats bread"; Punjabi says "the boy bread eats":

ਮੁੰਡਾ ਰੋਟੀ ਖਾਂਦਾ ਹੈ।

muṇḍā roṭī khāndā hai — boy · bread · eating · is

"The boy eats bread."

Once your ear expects the verb at the end, half of Punjabi's rhythm falls into place — poets save their best word for that final slot.

02 Gender — every noun picks a side open

Every Punjabi noun is masculine or feminine, and adjectives and verbs agree with it. The classic pattern: -ā endings lean masculine, -ī feminine — ਮੁੰਡਾ muṇḍā (boy) but ਕੁੜੀ kuṛī (girl); ਘੋੜਾ ghoṛā (horse) but ਘੋੜੀ ghoṛī (mare). Plurals follow suit: muṇḍā → ਮੁੰਡੇ muṇḍe, kuṛī → ਕੁੜੀਆਂ kuṛīā̃.

Loanwords get assigned a gender by feel and convention — ਲੱਸੀ lassī is feminine, ਦਿਲ dil masculine. When in doubt, listen for the verb ending; it will tell you.

03 Postpositions — prepositions, but after open

Where English puts little words before the noun (in the village), Punjabi puts them after: ਪਿੰਡ ਵਿੱਚ pind vich — "village in." The essential set:

PunjabiSaysExample
ਦਾ / ਦੀ / ਦੇof (agrees like an adjective)ਮਾਂ ਦੀ ਬੋਲੀ — mā̃ dī bolī, "mother's tongue"
ਨੂੰto / forਮੈਨੂੰ — mainū̃, "to me"
ਵਿੱਚinਖੇਤ ਵਿੱਚ — khet vich, "in the field"
ਤੋਂfromਪਿੰਡ ਤੋਂ — pind tō̃, "from the village"
ਨਾਲwithਯਾਰਾਂ ਨਾਲ — yārā̃ nāl, "with friends"
ਉੱਤੇ / ਤੇonਮੰਜੇ ਤੇ — manje te, "on the cot"

Notice ਦਾ/ਦੀ/ਦੇ changing shape: it agrees with the thing possessed, not the possessor — one of the first "aha" moments in Punjabi grammar.

04 Respect is grammatical — ਤੂੰ and ਤੁਸੀਂ open

Punjabi has two words for "you." ਤੂੰ tū̃ is intimate — for close friends, children, God in poetry (closeness, not disrespect). ਤੁਸੀਂ tusī̃ is respectful, used for elders, strangers, and anyone owed courtesy — and it takes plural verb forms even for one person. Politeness is finished with ਜੀ jī: hā̃ jī (yes), Sat Sri Akal jī.

The safe rule for learners: tusī̃ for everyone until invited otherwise. No Punjabi elder was ever offended by too much respect.

05 Tense in three moves — and the famous "ne" open

The working core: present habitual ਕਰਦਾ ਹੈ kardā hai (does), simple past ਕੀਤਾ kītā (did), future ਕਰੇਗਾ karegā (will do). Layer continuous and perfect forms on later; these three carry most conversations.

One elegant trap: in the past tense of transitive verbs, the doer takes ਨੇ ne and the verb agrees with the object, not the subject:

ਮੁੰਡੇ ਨੇ ਰੋਟੀ ਖਾਧੀ।

muṇḍe ne roṭī khādhī — the verb khādhī is feminine, agreeing with roṭī

"The boy ate the bread."

Linguists call this ergativity; Punjabi speakers call it Tuesday. Your ear will absorb it from the example sentences long before the rule feels natural.

06 The tones nobody warns you about open

Punjabi is South Asia's great tonal language — unusual among its Indo-Aryan siblings. Historically "breathy" letters (ਘ ਝ ਢ ਧ ਭ, and ਹ in certain positions) traded their breathiness for pitch: ਘਰ "house" is written ghar but in most dialects said closer to kàr, starting low and rising, while ਕਰ kar "do" stays level. The spelling remembers the old sound; the voice sings the new one.

Don't chase tones from a chart — absorb them from listening. But knowing they exist explains why the "gh" you hear from native speakers never sounds like the "gh" you were bracing for.

ਅੱਗੇ · اگے · onward

Keep the thread

Language learning is a daily craft, not a weekend project. Three small habits, and where each one leads next.

Daily · 1 minute

One word a day

Meet the word of the day, say it out loud, use its sentence once. The homepage greets you with it, too.

Today's word → Weekly · 20 minutes

One stanza a week

Open the Parallel Reader, read one stanza of Heer, save the words you didn't know. Two hundred and fifty years of readers before you started the same way.

Open the Reader → Whenever a song plays

Listen with the lyrics open

The music section unpacks the poetry beneath the songs you already love — the most enjoyable vocabulary drill ever devised.

Into the music →