Arabic and English wayfinding, done right to left.
DigiMaps runs one venue map in Arabic and English. When a visitor switches to Arabic, the whole kiosk or phone interface mirrors right to left, search ignores common spelling variants, and directions name landmarks in Arabic. Your team writes and approves every Arabic name in Studio before it reaches a screen.
- 1 The dock reverses: Home sits on the right in Arabic.
- 2 Level buttons move to the left edge.
- 3 The building is not mirrored. The lifts stay where they are.
- الصيدلية Pharmacy الأرضي
- العيادات الخارجية Outpatients الأرضي
Search that forgives Arabic spelling.
Visitors type the way they write, not the way your CAD file spells a room. Search runs on the kiosk itself and folds the spelling variants people actually use, so a missing hamza or a ه in place of ة still finds the right place.
| Visitor types | Why it matches | Finds |
|---|---|---|
| الصيدليه | ه typed for ة (taa marbuta) is folded | الصيدلية Pharmacy |
| الاشعة | Hamza forms on alef (أ إ آ) are folded | الأشعة Radiology |
| المصلي | ي typed for ى (alef maqsura) is folded | المصلى Prayer room |
| الطـــوارئ | Tatweel stretching is ignored | الطوارئ Emergency |
| العِيَادَات | Harakat (short-vowel marks) are ignored | العيادات Clinics |
| مختبر | The prefixes ال / وال / بال are stripped | المختبر Laboratory |
| ١٠٤ | Arabic-Indic digits read as room numbers | غرفة 104 Room 104 |
| الصيدلبة | One wrong letter, in a word of five or more letters | الصيدلية Pharmacy |
| حمام | Everyday word, matched through the pack’s synonyms | دورات المياه Restrooms |
Search also matches names across scripts, so a query in Latin letters can find a place whose name is written in Arabic. More on search and place cards in the Wayfinder on phones and websites.
Directions in Arabic name Arabic places.
Each step uses the name your team approved in Arabic. An Arabic step never falls back to the Latin label in the CAD drawing, and a lift ride is one instruction that names the floor you get out at.
Example: the step-free route from the main-entrance kiosk to Cardiology on Level 2 of our fictional demo hospital, 96 m, about 2 minutes. Multi-floor directions are checked in English and Arabic at every supported kiosk screen size in our own testing on demo venues.
| # | على الشاشة On screen, Arabic | On screen, English | In the drawing |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | أنت هنا · الأرضي | You are here · Ground | KIOSK G-01 |
| 2 | امشِ 62 م إلى المصعد | Walk 62 m to the lift | LIFT LOBBY |
| 3 | استخدم المصعد إلى الطابق 2 | Take the lift to Level 2 | LIFT LOBBY |
| 4 | امشِ 34 م | Walk 34 m | CORRIDOR 2 |
| 5 | الوصول إلى أمراض القلب | Arrive at Cardiology | CARDIOLOGY |
Arabic, Persian and Urdu spellings in your drawings.
One consultant writes a prayer room with a Persian ی, another numbers rooms in Persian digits. When Studio classifies the room text in a CAD file, it reads those letter variants and digits as the same text. The hospital pack’s rules are tested against 412 de-identified hospital CAD labels.
- 1 صيدليه ه written for ة الصيدلية Pharmacy
- 2 مصلی Persian and Urdu ی مصلى Prayer room
- 3 مکتب الاستقبال Persian ک for ك مكتب الاستقبال Reception
- 4 دورات المياه Exact match دورات المياه Restrooms
- 5 غرفة ۲۱۴ Persian digits غرفة 214 Room 214
- 6 غرفة تعقيم No rule matches غرفة تعقيم Staff only until reviewed
- 7 درج Connector درج Stairs
Your team approves every Arabic word.
We do not machine-translate your venue. Names, notices and signage slides are written in English and Arabic side by side. Each Arabic name carries a status, and none counts as approved until your reviewer approves it.
- Write both columns. Type or paste Arabic names next to the English ones in the Directory.
- Review, then approve. Each name moves from Missing to Draft, Reviewed and Approved.
- Approve the interface text. The kiosk’s built-in Arabic arrives as draft. Approval is tied to the exact wording, so changed text needs approving again.
- Check template wording. If a notice uses template text that is still a draft, someone must tick “I’ve checked it” before it goes out.
What each other language gets today.
Venue content can be written in any of 54 languages, up to 24 per venue, and right-to-left scripts such as Urdu, Persian and Hebrew get the mirrored layout automatically. What comes built in differs by language, and we would rather you knew before the kiosks arrive.
| Language | Kiosk buttons and labels | Industry-pack wording | Map label font | On-screen keyboard |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| English | Built in | Complete | Bundled | Latin |
| Arabic العربية RTL | Built in, approved by your team | Complete | Bundled (IBM Plex Sans Arabic) | Arabic |
| Urdu اردو RTL | English until you add Urdu text | Draft | Arabic-script font bundled; check your labels with us | Urdu |
| Persian فارسی RTL | English until you add Persian text | Not included | Arabic-script font bundled; check your labels with us | Persian |
| Hindi हिन्दी | English until you add Hindi text | Draft | You supply a Devanagari font | Devanagari |
| Russian and Chinese | Built in, approved by your team | Draft | Cyrillic bundled; you supply a Chinese font | Cyrillic only; no Chinese layout |
| Malayalam, Tamil, Bengali and other Indic scripts | English until you add your text | Not included | You supply the font | No layout |
Studio is in English. Visitors see your languages; your editors see English buttons with right-to-left Arabic fields.
Kiosks reset between visitors. After 60 seconds idle, by default, the language returns to the kiosk’s default. See how the kiosk software handles each visitor.
Gulf venues. Hosting, privacy and delivery are covered on our pages for wayfinding in the UAE and indoor wayfinding in Saudi Arabia.
Questions about Arabic and English
Does the whole kiosk switch to right to left, or only the text?
The whole interface. The dock, search box, place cards and step list run from the right, and every label is set in an Arabic typeface. The map is not mirrored, so the lifts stay on the same side of the building in both languages. When the visitor walks away, the kiosk resets to its default language.
Do you translate our place names into Arabic for us?
There is no automatic translation. Your team writes or pastes the Arabic name next to the English one in Studio, and a reviewer approves it. The industry packs already include complete Arabic wording for categories and search synonyms, and the kiosk interface ships with Arabic text that your reviewer approves before it goes live.
Will visitors find a place if they spell it differently in Arabic?
Usually, yes. Search ignores hamza forms, taa marbuta, alef maqsura, tatweel and harakat, strips the prefixes ال, وال and بال, reads Arabic-Indic digits, and tolerates one wrong letter in longer words. Synonyms add everyday words, so حمام finds the restrooms.
Can directions be read aloud in Arabic?
Yes, where the device has an Arabic voice. The Listen button uses the kiosk’s own text-to-speech voices and is hidden when no voice exists for the chosen language. Check that the kiosk hardware you plan to buy includes an Arabic voice before you rely on it.
Can a visitor start in Arabic on the kiosk and carry on with their phone?
Yes. The QR code on the kiosk carries the destination, the starting kiosk, the language and the step-free choice, so the phone opens the same route in Arabic. It opens in the phone’s browser, with no app to install.
Is Studio itself available in Arabic?
Not yet. Studio’s buttons and menus are in English. Arabic fields in Studio switch to right-to-left typing, and everything visitors see can be written and approved in Arabic.
Plan an Arabic and English pilot
In a 30-minute call we show the demo hospital on a kiosk and a phone in both languages, right to left. Bring a floor plan and your list of place names, and we will tell you what an Arabic and English pilot would need.