Thai

อักษรไทย
Thai Left-to-right Living Abugida Southeast Asian
Sample Text
สวัสดีชาวโลก

Sample Characters

First 48 characters from Thai (U+0E01–U+0E5B)

About Thai

The Thai script is an abugida used to write the Thai language and several minority languages of Thailand. Created in 1283 CE by King Ramkhamhaeng, it descends from the Khmer script, which in turn derived from the ancient Brahmi script of India.

Thai script is written left-to-right with no spaces between words. It has 44 consonants, 15 vowel symbols, and four tone marks. Like other Southeast Asian scripts, Thai uses an inherent vowel system and complex vowel and tone indicators placed above, below, before, after, or around the consonant.

Data sourced from the ISO 15924 registry, Unicode CLDR, and the Unicode Character Database.

Script Family & Lineage

Ancestor Chain
Brahmi Khmer Thai
Descended Scripts

Languages Using Thai 7

Frequently Asked Questions

What type of writing system is Thai?
Thai is an Abugida. Abugidas (alphasyllabaries) use consonant characters with an inherent vowel modified by diacritics.
What direction does Thai read?
Thai is written Left-to-right, the same direction as most European scripts.
How many languages use the Thai script?
7 languages use Thai according to Unicode CLDR data. Together these languages are spoken by approximately 60M people worldwide.
When was the Thai script created?
The Thai script originated around 1283 CE.
Does Thai have uppercase and lowercase letters?
Thai does not have separate uppercase and lowercase forms. Each consonant carries an inherent vowel sound that is modified by diacritical marks.

Compare Thai With Another Script

Direction, characters, languages — side by side.

Key Facts

ISO Code
Thai
ISO Number
352
Script Type
Abugida
Direction
Left-to-right
Status
Living
Region
Southeast Asian
Characters
86
Introduced
1283 CE
Languages
7
Total Speakers
~60M

Unicode Ranges

  • Thai
    U+0E01–U+0E5B

Script Properties

Has Case
No
Cursive
No
Vowels
inherent

Official Use In

TH