Skip to content
KCOkurds.global
Your country is not known yet
EN

Not yet in these languages

Sign in Join

at launch · Language · kmr-Latn · Iranian, Northwestern, Kurdish

Kurmanji (Northern Kurdish)

Kurmancî · Latn script, written left to right. Spoken in Türkiye, Syria, northern Iraq and Iran, the former USSR and most of the diaspora.

See the courses

kurds.globalThis variety

kmr-Latn · Latn · left to right · at launch

Language · kmr-Latn · Iranian, Northwestern, Kurdish · at launch

Kurmanji (Northern Kurdish)

Kurmancî · Latn script, written left to right. Spoken in Türkiye, Syria, northern Iraq and Iran, the former USSR and most of the diaspora.

See the courses

On the mapWhere spokenrecordedCourses3
Now
Academy128 courses, 128 open for enrolmentCivic3 campaigns, 6 programmesHeritage70 days to keep, 34 chronology entriesNews80 approved sources, no confirmed events yetCommunity Cellsforming. No Chapter is recognised yet
ScriptLatnleft to rightat launch
Translate a page in this variety

Record

kmr-Latn
KurmancîKurmanji (Northern Kurdish) · Latn
Code
kmr-Latn
Family
Iranian, Northwestern, Kurdish
Where
Türkiye, Syria, northern Iraq and Iran, the former USSR and most of the diaspora
Phase
at launch
Coverage
not yet measured
Codes are BCP 47 language and script subtags.

Courses that teach it

3 in the catalogue
Kurmanji A1 (Latin)KCO-LNG-01 · Open for enrolment on study.kurds.global
Open
Kurmanji A2 to B1KCO-LNG-02 · Open for enrolment on study.kurds.global
Open
Kurmanji B2 to C1KCO-LNG-03 · Open for enrolment on study.kurds.global
Open
Courses from the Academy catalogue; a course opens for enrolment one by one after review.
The Academy

Translate as a task

coverage per page, from NXS Translate
pages translatedunknown
segments approvedunknown
A page you translate here is a task in a language course. The translation service is not open yet. Coverage shows when it opens.
Translate a page

Writing

1 script

Its own names

Kurmancî
left to right
کورمانجی
right to left
Кӧрмаънщи
left to right

Scripts

Latn31 letters
  • Hawar Latin alphabet (ç ê î ş û); the diaspora's majority variety

From one script to another

Kurdish Latin to Cyrillic, ALA-LC (2012)Letter by letter, from the Hawar Latin letters to Kurdish Cyrillic.
Kurdish Latin to the Arabic-based alphabet, ALA-LC (2012)A word that starts with a vowel, and a vowel after a vowel, take the seat ئ. Short i is not written.
Names in the language's own writing; each sample keeps its direction.
All scripts

Resources

6 resources
Kurdish-English Dictionary (Chyet, 2003)dictionary · Yale University Press · link not checked
to verify
Library of the Kurdish Institute of Parislibrary · Institut kurde de Paris · checked 2026-10-23
verified
Centre for Kurdish Studiesresearch · University of Exeter · checked 2026-10-23
verified
Dengê Amerîka (VOA Kurdish)media · Voice of America (United States) · checked 2026-10-23 · Publicly funded broadcaster.
verified
TRT Kurdîmedia · Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (Türkiye) · link not checked · Public broadcaster.
to verify
Glottolog: Northern Kurdishreference · Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology · checked 2026-10-23
verified
Each resource shows whether its link was checked. A resource without a checked link is labelled to verify.

Linguistics

family, dialects, sounds and standing
Family
Indo-European, then Classical Indo-European, then Indo-Iranian, then Iranian-Nuristani, then Iranian, then Central Iranian PBS, then Central Iranian PB, then Northwestern Iranian, then Laki-Kurdish, then Kurdish
Codes
ISO 639-3 kmr · macrolanguage kur · Glottolog nort2641
Dialects
Northern Kurdish: Northern Kurmanji, Southeastern Kurmanji, Southern Kurmanji, Western Kurmanji (28 listed in all)
Standing
Northern Kurdish: threatened (6b (Threatened)) secondary
Sounds
30 consonants and 8 vowels, after Thackston 2006 · the inventory verified

b d d̠ʒ f ɡ h ħ j kʰ kˤ l m n pʰ q r ɾ ʁ s ʃ tʰ t̠ʃʰ t̠ʃˤ tˤ v w z ʒ ʢ χ æ ɑ e i ɪ o u ʊ

Kurdish
verified
Verify, add a source or report
Help check this value

What happens next. A steward reads your note and checks the source. The page changes only after that. You are not named.

Grammar in short

  • Word order is usually subject, object, verb.
  • Nouns have two genders, masculine and feminine, shown in the oblique case and the ezafe.
  • Nouns and pronouns have a direct and an oblique case.
  • Past tenses of transitive verbs are ergative: the subject takes the oblique case and the verb agrees with the object.
  • The ezafe (-ê, -a, -ên) links a noun to the words that describe it.
  • Prepositions often pair with a postposition, as in di ... de.

to verify · Thackston. Kurmanji Kurdish: A Reference Grammar with Selected Readings.; Haig and Öpengin. Kurdish: A critical research overview. Kurdish Studies 2 (2).

Dialect or language

ISO 639-3 gives Kurmanji its own code (kmr) inside the Kurdish macrolanguage. Many speakers and Kurdish institutions call it a dialect of one Kurdish language. Linguists differ on where to draw the line.

to verify · ISO 639-3 code tables. SIL International, registration authority.; Haig and Öpengin. Kurdish: A critical research overview. Kurdish Studies 2 (2).

Three scripts

Kurmanji is written in the Hawar Latin alphabet in Türkiye, Syria and most of the diaspora, in the Arabic-based alphabet in Iraq and Iran, and in Cyrillic in the former Soviet Union.

to verify · Library of Congress. ALA-LC Romanization Tables: Kurdish, 2012 version.; Haig and Öpengin. Kurdish: A critical research overview. Kurdish Studies 2 (2).

In law

The Constitution of Türkiye (Article 42) says no language other than Turkish shall be taught as a mother tongue to Turkish citizens at any institution of education.Constitute Project. Constitutions of the world, English translations.
verified
The Constitution of Iraq (2005) makes Arabic and Kurdish the two official languages of Iraq.Constitute Project. Constitutions of the world, English translations.
verified
The Syrian Constitution of 2012 makes Arabic the official language of the state.Constitute Project. Constitutions of the world, English translations.
verified

Speakers

unknown
Measure
speakers
Year
not recorded
Source
No source yet. We show unknown, not a guess.
Status
unknown
Verify, add a source or report
Help check this value

What happens next. A steward reads your note and checks the source. The page changes only after that. You are not named.

No speaker figure has been verified for this platform yet. It stays unknown until a census or survey figure is checked with its measure, year and source.

Classification and standing from the sources named on each line. Where views differ, each view is shown with its sources.

Learn

3 courses
1
Kurmanji A1 (Latin)KCO-LNG-01 · Open for enrolment on study.kurds.global
2
Kurmanji A2 to B1KCO-LNG-02 · Open for enrolment on study.kurds.global
3
Kurmanji B2 to C1KCO-LNG-03 · Open for enrolment on study.kurds.global
A course opens after its outline is reviewed. Until then it is listed with its state.
All courses

Key

labels and checks
  • verifiedA figure or claim read at its primary source by a steward or checkers from at least two communities.
  • secondaryA figure or claim cited through a reviewed work rather than read at its primary source.
  • to verifyA figure or claim whose source has not yet been read; it stays in the verification queue.
  • unknownNo source yet. We show unknown, not a guess.
A steward checks the source before anything changes. You are not named.
Formats
This record · JSONMarkdownRSS · varietiesAtomJSON FeedCSVJSONCardevery value keeps its source and label