12 Most Beautiful Written Language Scripts in the World

Written language is more than 5,000 years old. Over time, many different scripts have developed as beautiful visual representations of the languages we speak. Currently, there are an estimated 4,000 different languages with their own writing systems. There’s an incredible amount of diversity among these scripts, and many are simply beautiful.

Which written languages are the most beautiful? We’ll explore some of the most visually appealing languages in the world in this post — read on to learn more.

The 12 Most Beautiful Written Language Scripts in the World

1. Devanagari

देवनागरी लिपि

The word Devanagari roughly translates to “from the abode of divinity.” It’s also the name of a script that’s used widely throughout south Asia. It’s used to write many different languages including Hindi, Sanskrit, and Nepali. Some of these languages include some unique characters in the written form, but they’re all visually appealing.

One of the most immediately recognizable features of Devanagari is the straight horizontal line all characters share on their top sides. This creates an even more overwhelming sense of unity among the characters than we see in languages like Tibetan that share some visual characteristics. 

The pleasing curves and swirls in the characters of this writing system create a sense of fluidity that makes it an enjoyable one to look at. Is it any wonder so many languages use this script in their writing?

2. Chinese

中文

This language is known for having one of the most difficult writing systems to master. In fact, with over 50,000 unique characters, complete mastery may be all but impossible. In addition to its fame for being difficult, Chinese characters are the oldest continuously used form of written language. They are also known for their beauty.

Chinese calligraphy is the art of combining visual art with the literary meanings that come from the characters. It’s an art that was practiced in ancient China and is still highly respected today. The rhythm, timing, and shapes of the strokes are all part of creating this impressive art form.

Since written Chinese uses logograms — symbols used to depict a whole word — a huge variety of characters is used when writing the language. This makes it difficult to learn, but it also makes it one of the most visually interesting languages to look at. 

Each character has its own proper stroke order and shape. The number of strokes is often much higher than you’ll find in languages that use an alphabet; the character for biáng in biángbiáng noodles, for example, has 58 strokes in its traditional form.

3. Burmese

မြန်မာဘာသာ

Originally following a square block format, Burmese is now written in a cursive style that is full of curves and nearly complete circles; it could even be described as bubbly. The alphabet is used in multiple languages that are spoken in present-day Myanmar, and it originated in south India.

Like Tibetan, written Burmese requires no spaces between words, which makes it even more impressive visually. In modern Burmese, however, spaces are often added in order to improve readability. There are 33 consonants and 12 vowels in this alphabet, and it’s used by over 30 million native speakers.

4. Traditional Mongolian

ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠬᠡᠯᠡ

One of the things that makes the traditional Mongolian script so beautiful is that it’s written vertically, from top to bottom. There’s also an emphasis placed on visual harmony between letters, which is immediately noticeable when reading the language.

Where scripts like Devanagari have a horizontal line running through the text, traditional Mongolian text can be written with a unifying vertical line. While the script is undeniably beautiful, computers continue to have difficulties in rendering the alphabet accurately; it often shows up on computers reading from left to right instead of vertically, for example.

Modern Mongolian has been written with the Cyrillic alphabet since 1946, but languages like Oirat and Manchu still use the traditional alphabet.

5. Tibetan

བོད་སྐད

With just over one million native speakers worldwide, Tibetan certainly isn’t the most widely spoken language in the world, but it is one of the most beautiful. Tibetan is especially beautiful in its written form simply for the way the letters are styled. A pleasing combination of curves and straight lines come together in this alphabet where all letters share an element of visual unity in having a block-like top line. This pattern can be seen especially well in longer paragraphs.

An interesting feature of written Tibetan is that spaces are not used to separate words. Instead, there’s a mark that’s used to indicate the start of a new syllable. Since many Tibetan words are only one syllable, this mark often separates words. The lack of spaces between words adds to the visually striking nature of this script.

6. Sinhala

සිංහල

The Sinhala language is spoken by the Sinhalese people in Sri Lanka, and the script is visually stunning. There’s something almost psychedelic in the way letters curve and spiral in on themselves.

One interesting feature of the Sinhala alphabet is that vowels can actually take two different shapes: an independent and a diacritic. If a vowel follows a consonant, it appears as a diacritical mark attached to that consonant; if a vowel begins a word, its independent form is used.

There are around 17 million people that speak Sinhala, and the written system is thought to have originated around the third century BC.

7. Balinese

Not only is the Balinese script beautiful, but it’s also thought to have some extra “holy powers” by some. The text is currently used mostly in religious contexts, especially in those related to Hinduism, and there are some letters that are considered to have powers beyond the sounds they represent.

The script itself makes use of tightly woven lines and curls that give it an exotic look to the unfamiliar eye — you’d be hard-pressed to find a solitary straight line in a Balinese text. 

On the high end of the spectrum, Balinese consists of 47 letters. Each of these letters comes with an implied vowel sound connected to it, depending on the diacritics that surround it. Something that adds to the script’s beauty is that many letters can be combined into ligatures, or single symbols consisting of two separate letters.

8. Arabic

Arabic is famous for its written form. For those that don’t read or write the language, it’s a dizzying swirl of lines, curves, and dots. For those that can read Arabic, this language that’s written from right to left carries great meaning. 

Arabic is used as a ceremonial language for Islam, and examples of calligraphy in the language are some of the most beautiful in the world, as anyone who has visited a mosque will learn. It takes great skill to learn Arabic calligraphy. This is in part because of the way the script uses geometry to create beautiful images that also carry linguistic meaning.

There are over 420 million people that speak Arabic and can use this beautiful writing system, and there are several other languages that have similar scripts, such as Urdu and Farsi.

9. Hebrew

עברית

Hebrew shares more than its beauty with Arabic; both languages have alphabets that have origins involving the Aramaic alphabet. They’re also both written from right to left. While the two languages don’t aren’t vastly different visually, you probably wouldn’t mistake one for the other. Where Arabic letters are connected and involve lots of smooth curves, Hebrew employs blockier shapes. This is why it’s actually sometimes referred to as “square script” or “block script.”

Some visual aspects that make Hebrew a beautiful language are the varying thicknesses of lines and the use of dots above or below letters. There are 22 letters in this alphabet, and it originally didn’t include any consonants. In everyday written modern Hebrew, readers are able to determine the location of vowels from the consonants in the world in combination with the context and part of speech.

10. Georgian

ქართული

This often-overlooked language has some gorgeous scripts. There are actually three different writing systems used for the Georgian language, but modern Georgian is written in what is called Mkhedruli, which means “military” or “cavalry” in Georgian. Interestingly, there isn’t a great deal that’s known about its origins.

The letters in Georgian are very loopy, and some have long tails that extend from their center, making it look like something out of science fiction. 

Located in an area of the world where Russian and Latin writing systems have taken over many languages, Georgians have plenty of reason to be proud of their unique, beautiful written language. The alphabet has even been added to the UNESCO list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

11. Armenian

Հայերէն

Used widely throughout the Ottoman Empire during the 18th and 19th centuries, the Armenian alphabet is now used to write the national language of Armenia and by more than five million Armenian speakers. 

The letters in the Armenian alphabet stand out because of their relative simplicity when compared to the others in this list, but also because of their pleasing shape. Armenian calligraphy has its own special flair in the way its letters are organized into beautiful geometric shapes.

There are 39 letters in the modern Armenian alphabet, though it originally consisted of just 36. The Armenian alphabet was developed by an Armenian linguist around 405 AD and has been used continuously ever since.

12. Geʽez

Don’t feel bad if you haven’t heard of this language before. Today, Geʽez is only used as a liturgical language in Ethiopia and isn’t spoken as a native language. Its script, however, is used in several different languages, including Amharic and Tigrinya. In these languages, the script is referred to as fidäl, which means “script” or “letter.”

This writing system may especially appeal to those that like an alphabet to consist of distinct letters that don’t blend into each other. There’s something of a runic quality to the characters in this script — the blocklike shape that texts take could conjure images of inscriptions in stone.

The punctuation that’s used in this written language is particularly interesting. A series of dots in specific orders and patterns are used to denote commas, full stops, question marks, and paragraph breaks.