ط (ṭāʾ) is letter 16 of the 28 in the Arabic alphabet, between ض ḍād and ظ ẓāʾ. Its sound is a heavy t, said with the tongue pulled back. It joins on both sides, so it has four shapes: ط ط ط ط. It is a sun letter, and its abjad value is 9.
Hear its name, طاء (ṭāʾ):
Ṭāʾ in all four positions
Ṭāʾ joins to the letter before it and to the letter after it, so its shape depends on where it sits in a word. Alone it is ط. At the start of a word it is ط, in the middle ط, and at the end ط.
| Position | Shape | Code point | Where you see it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Isolated | ط | U+FEC1 | written alone, or after a letter that does not join forward |
| Initial | ط | U+FEC3 | at the start of a word or a piece of a word |
| Medial | ط | U+FEC4 | between two letters that join it |
| Final | ط | U+FEC2 | at the end of a word, joined from the letter before |
Typed text stores all four shapes as one character, U+0637 (ARABIC LETTER TAH); the codes in the table, U+FEC1 to U+FEC4, are presentation forms that the Unicode Arabic FAQ does not recommend for regular text.
Ṭāʾ is number 22 of the 28 letters by frequency, 0.9% of all letters, in the 50,000 most common word forms of Arabic film and TV subtitles (hermitdave/FrequencyWords, OpenSubtitles 2018), each form counted as often as it occurs; it is initial in 27%, medial in 53%, final in 17% and alone in 4% of its occurrences.
How to pronounce ṭāʾ
The sound of ṭāʾ is a heavy t, said with the tongue pulled back, written ṭ in the transliteration of our Arabic alphabet chart. The chart's note on it reads: emphatic "t"; deeper and heavier than ت. English has no exact match, which puts ṭāʾ among the eleven sounds covered on our Arabic pronunciation guide. Its row from that guide:
| Where it is made | A t with the back of the tongue pulled up and back |
|---|---|
| Nearest English | The t in tall, said darker |
| Confused with | ت t |
| Word pair that tests it | طِين ṭīn, mud / تِين tīn, figs |
In Arabic chat writing, where speakers type Arabic in Latin letters, ṭāʾ is written 6.
Arabic words with ṭāʾ
These 5 everyday words show ṭāʾ in real writing: it is initial in طير and طين; medial in بطة and إفطار; final in قط. The first three are the practice words printed on its worksheet; the others come from our Arabic pronunciation guide and our page of Islamic phrases in Arabic, and more words by topic are in our Arabic vocabulary lists.
| Word | Transliteration | Meaning | Ṭāʾ here | Listen |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| طير | ṭayr | bird | initial | |
| بطة | baṭṭa | duck | medial | |
| قط | qiṭṭ | cat | final | |
| طين | ṭīn | mud | initial | |
| إفطار | ifṭār | the meal that breaks the fast | medial |
Ṭāʾ with al-, and its number
Ṭāʾ is a sun letter, so the l of al- (the) goes silent before it: الطير is said aṭ-ṭayr, the bird (test any word in our sun and moon letters checker).
Its abjad value is 9 in both the Mashriqi and the Maghribi order; our abjad calculator adds up whole words. Ṭāʾ is also one of the five qalqalah letters of Quran recitation, ق ط ب ج د: when its vowel is cancelled, by a sukūn or by stopping on it at the end of a sentence, reciters give it a slight bounce, as the Wikipedia article on tajweed describes. Our tajweed rules chart marks it in colour.
Letters that look like ṭāʾ
Ṭāʾ and ظ ẓāʾ share the same body, and only the dots tell them apart:
- ط ṭāʾ: no dot
- ظ ẓāʾ: one dot above
Ṭāʾ is the emphatic partner of tāʾ ت: طِين ṭīn is mud, تِين tīn is figs. If someone listening can tell which of the two you meant, your tongue is far enough back.
Practise writing ṭāʾ
Trace it on the free ṭāʾ tracing worksheet (PDF, one page, 66 KB), which prints its four shapes beside طير (ṭayr), بطة (baṭṭa) and قط (qiṭṭ); the other 27 are on our Arabic writing worksheets page.
Frequently asked questions
How do you pronounce the Arabic letter ṭāʾ?
The sound of ṭāʾ (ط) is a heavy t, said with the tongue pulled back, written ṭ in transliteration. Our alphabet chart notes: emphatic "t"; deeper and heavier than ت. Learners often confuse it with ت t.
Does ṭāʾ join to the next letter?
Yes. Ṭāʾ joins on both sides, so it has four forms: ط alone, ط at the start of a word, ط in the middle and ط at the end.
Is ṭāʾ a sun letter or a moon letter?
A sun letter. Before ṭāʾ the l of al- goes silent and the letter doubles, so الطير is said aṭ-ṭayr (the bird).
Which Arabic letters look like ṭāʾ?
ط ṭāʾ has no dot and ظ ẓāʾ has one dot above. They share one shape and differ only in their dots.