Urdu is an Indo-Aryan language with about 104 million speakers, including those who speak it as a second language. It is the national language of Pakistan.

A lot of Urdu vocabulary comes from Persian and Arabic. Urdu has been written with a version of the Perso-Arabic script since the 12th century and is normally written in Nastaliq style. The word Urdu is Turkish for 'foreign' or 'horde'.

The Urdu alphabet has 39 basic letters and 13 extra characters, 52 all together. It is written from right to left.