Step by step
How to use the sanskrit keyboard
- 1The keyboard above is already set to Sanskrit; you can switch language from the list if you need another.
- 2Click the keys on screen, or just type — your own keyboard is remapped to the layout shown.
- 3Use Shift for the second layer, which carries the rest of the characters.
- 4Copy the text when you are done, or download it as a .txt file.
Why type Sanskrit in a browser
Adding Sanskrit to an operating system is a settings-menu expedition that ends in a keyboard you cannot see: the letters are not printed on your keys, so you are typing blind in a script you may have no muscle memory for, and you have changed a system-wide setting to write one line.
The usual workaround is worse — hunting characters in a character-map utility and pasting them one at a time, or copying words out of search results and hoping the spelling survived the trip.
A visible keyboard solves the specific problem of writing Sanskrit occasionally: typing a śloka or a mantra accurately rather than approximating it, quoting a verse in an essay, a thesis or a set of notes, or preparing Sanskrit homework or a passage for a class. Every key is on screen, the arrangement is the standard one, and when you are finished there is nothing to undo.
Sanskrit is where the halant earns its keep
Sanskrit stacks consonants further than any modern Indian language, and every one of those clusters is built the same way: consonant, halant ्, consonant. The halant is on the D position. त्त्व, ग्ध्, ष्ट्र and द्ध all come out of repeated application of that one key, and the renderer assembles the shape.
The vowels ऋ and ॠ are ordinary Sanskrit letters rather than curiosities. The independent ऋ is on the Shift layer at the right end of the number row; the matra ृ is unshifted in the same place, which is what writes कृष्ण and मृत्यु.
Two marks do most of the remaining work. Visarga, the ः on the Shift layer of the number row, ends a great many words — रामः, दुःख. Anusvara ं sits on the S position, and in Sanskrit it is a real phoneme with its own rules rather than a shorthand.
What is not on this board: accents and the avagraha
InScript is a keyboard for modern Indian languages, and Sanskrit's classical apparatus sits outside it. The Vedic accent marks — udātta U+0951, anudātta U+0952 — are not on any layer here, and neither is the avagraha ऽ that marks an elided अ in sandhi.
For ordinary Classical Sanskrit this is rarely a problem: the great majority of quoted verse, liturgy and school material uses none of them. For Vedic text, where the accents are the point, this keyboard will get you most of the way and not all of it, and that is worth knowing before you rely on it for an edition.
Candrabindu ँ, which Sanskrit does use, is present — on the Shift layer of the bottom row beside the anusvara. So is the danda ।, the full stop of Devanagari, at the comma position on Shift.
Unicode Devanagari against transliteration
Sanskrit is written two ways in practice: in Devanagari, and in romanised transliteration — IAST, with its macrons and dots, or Harvard-Kyoto and ITRANS, which use plain ASCII. Each has its place, and they are not the same artefact.
Devanagari is what a reader of the tradition expects and what any Indian-language publication will want. Romanised transliteration is what Western academic conventions often require and what survives a system that cannot render Indic script at all. If you are writing for a journal, check which one the style guide asks for before typing a verse twice.
What this keyboard produces is Unicode Devanagari — searchable, paste-able and font-independent. It is not transliteration, and converting between the two is a scheme-mapping job rather than a typing one.
On a phone, and on a desktop
On a phone the on-screen layout is the one you tap, and the device's own keyboard is kept from opening over the top of it — which is the failure that makes most virtual keyboards useless on mobile. Text still pastes in from elsewhere as usual.
On a desktop you can use either. The keys on screen are there to be read, and your own keyboard is simultaneously remapped to the Sanskrit layout, matched by physical position so it holds up under any system layout.
Either way the text never leaves the page: no upload, no account, no server to trust. Copy it out when you are done, or download it as a plain .txt file.
Answers
Frequently asked questions
How do I type a long conjunct like द्ध or ष्ट्र?
With the halant on the D position, repeatedly: consonant, halant, consonant, halant, consonant. The renderer forms the stack as you go.
Are the Vedic accent marks available?
No. Udātta and anudātta are outside the InScript layout, as is the avagraha ऽ. Classical Sanskrit rarely needs them; Vedic text does, and this board will not cover it fully.
How do I type ऋ and the ृ matra?
Both are at the right end of the number row — the matra unshifted, the independent vowel on Shift.
How do I get the text out?
Copy it, or download it as a .txt file. Editing keys work normally throughout — Backspace, the arrows and Ctrl or Cmd shortcuts all behave as usual.
Is anything stored between visits?
No. There is no account and no history; the text lives in the page until you close it. Nothing is sent to a server at any point.