‘AIN

ع غ

ع Click the letter to hear its pronunciation.

	Final	Medial	Initial	Detached
Additional Examples	ﻊ	ﻌ	ﻋ	ع

Sounds

‘AIN is a rare letter found mainly in words borrowed from Arabic, in which it represents a “glottal stop”. In Urdu its sound and function are essentially the same as ALIF’s. It is not, however, interchangeable with ALIF. You will need to learn which words are spelled with ‘AIN (ع) and which are spelled with ALIF (ا).
No Hindi equivalent.

‘AIN is usually transliterated with an apostrophe.

At the beginning of a word ‘AIN can carry any of the three short vowels:

Sound	Example (transliteration)	Example (Urdu)	Hindi Equivalent
“a” as in “about”	‘arab	عرب	अरब
“i” as in “inner”	‘izzat	عزّت	इज़्ज़त
“u” as in “put”	‘urs	عرس	उर्स

At the beginning of a word ‘AIN is silent when followed by another vowel letter:

Sound	Example (transliteration)	Example (Urdu)	Hindi Equivalent
silent	‘ām	عام	आम
silent	‘aurat	عورت	औरत

In the middle or end of any word, ‘AIN is a wild card: it can represent almost any vowel sound or the consonant “y”.

Example (transliteration)	Example (Urdu)	Hindi Equivalent
ba’ad	بعد	बाद
sho’lay	شعلے	शोले
shama’	شمع	शमा
shāyar	شاعر	शायर

Connections

‘AIN can connect from both sides: Thus it has four forms: detached, initial, medial, and final.