Kannada alphabet

Alphabet of the Kannada language, one of the Dravidian languages in India.

General

The language has 52 characters in its alphabet and is phonetic. The Kannada character set is almost identical to that of other Indian languages. The number of written symbols, however, is far more than the 52 characters in the alphabet, owing to the fact that different characters can be combined to form compound characters (ottaksharas). Each written symbol in the Kannada script corresponds with one syllable, as opposed to one phoneme in languages like English. The Kannada writng system is an abugida, with consonants appearing with an inherent vowel.

The alphabet is classified into three categories: swaras (or vowels), vyanjanas (or consonants) and yogavaahas (part vowel/part consonants).

Note: Unicode character entities used below. You will need a font that supports Kannada to see the characters. English transliterations based on Unicode character names listed next to symbol.

Vowels

There are fourteen vowels (swaras): ಅ (a), ಆ (aa), ಇ (e), ಈ (ee), ಉ (u), ಊ (uu), ಋ (rr), ೠ (between rruu and rrii); ಎ (a~), ಏ (ea), ಐ (ai), ಒ (o), ಓ (oo), ಔ (ou)

Consonants

Two types of consonants are identified in Kannada - the structured consonants and the unstructured consonants. The structured consonants are classified according to where the tongue touches the palate of the mouth and are classified accordingly into five structured groups. The five consonants in each structured group, in order, are voiceless, voiceless aspirate, voiced, voiced aspirate, and nasal.

Structured consonants

Velars - ಕ (ka), ಖ (kha), ಗ (ga), ಘ (gha), ಙ (nga)

Palatals - ಚ (ca), ಛ (cha), ಜ (ja), ಝ (jha), ಞ (nya)

Retroflex - ಟ (tta), ಠ (ttha), ಡ (dda), ಢ (ddha), ಣ (nna)

Dentals - ತ (ta), ಥ (tha), ದ (da), ಧ (dha), ನ (na)

Labials - ಪ (pa), ಫ (pha), ಬ (ba), ಭ (bha), ಮ (ma)

See place of articulation for more information on tongue positions.

Unstructured Consonants

The unstructured consonants are consonants that do not fall into any of the abpve structures: ಯ (ya), ರ (ra), ಲ (la), ವ (va), ಶ (sha), ಷ (ssa), ಸ (sa), ಹ (ha), ಳ (lla)

Yogavaahas

The yogavaahas (part-vowel, part consonant) include the anusvara: ಂ (am), and the visarga: ಃ (ah)

Numbers

The decimal numbers in the script are: ೦ (0), ೧ (1), ೨ (2), ೩ (3); ೪ (4), ೫ (5), ೬ (6), ೭ (7), ೮ (8), ೯ (9)