# Singlish to Sinhala Converter - Type Sinhala Unicode with English Letters

Page: https://hirantha.me/tools/singlish-to-sinhala
Part of: Hirantha Sandaruwan Lakshan free tools (https://hirantha.me/tools)
Updated: 2026-10-13

Type Sinhala with English letters. A documented, predictable Singlish to Sinhala Unicode converter with a typing guide and a copy button.

This is a free tool that runs in the browser: open the page to use it. File tools process files on the visitor's own device; files are never uploaded or stored. No account, sign-up, payment or watermark.

Type with English letters and read Sinhala Unicode as you go: ammaa becomes අම්මා and aayuboowan becomes ආයුබෝවන් (a doubled letter makes a long vowel). The mapping is fixed and written out on this page, so the same letters always give the same result. It is this tool's own scheme, not a standard: Singlish has no single standard, so keys differ from other Singlish keyboards, and some words need a different spelling than you are used to. It runs in your browser, nothing is sent anywhere, and the result can be pasted into any app that supports Unicode Sinhala.

Each Latin key stands for one Sinhala letter or vowel sign. The converter reads your text from left to right and always takes the longest key that matches, so aae is one vowel and not a plus ae. Case matters. Lowercase gives the basic letters, and capital letters give the retroflex and special ones: t is ත and T is ට, d is ද and D is ඩ, n is න and N is ණ, l is ල and L is ළ, s is ස and S is ෂ. A capital that has no key of its own is read as its lowercase letter, so a capital A or K at the start of a sentence does no harm. A capital that is a key (T, D, N, L, S, H and a few more) keeps its own meaning, so type those in lowercase when you mean ත, ද, න, ල, ස or හ.

A consonant on its own carries the vowel a. A vowel key after a consonant gives the vowel sign, so ki is කි and kee is කේ. Long vowels are typed with two letters (aa, ii, uu, ee, oo). When a consonant is followed by another consonant, a space, punctuation or the end of the text, it gets hal kirima, the sign that removes its vowel. That gives kk as ක්ක, nd as න්ද and ndh as න්ධ.

Three joins use a zero width joiner, an invisible character that the Unicode Standard uses to ask for the reduced form of a letter. A consonant followed by r gives rakaransaya (kra is ක්‍ර), a consonant followed by y gives yansaya (dya is ද්‍ය), and r followed by a consonant gives repaya (karma is කර්‍ම). The letter x is the anusvara ං (laxkaa is ලංකා) and a capital H after a letter is the visarga ඃ. A backslash is an invisible separator that stops two keys joining: n\G is න්ග, while nG is ඟ.

The casual way to type Singlish uses one a for both the short and the long sound, and the tool cannot guess which words end in a long vowel. The word amma gives අම්ම, because a single a is short. The word ammaa gives අම්මා. If you are used to th for ත and t for ට, note that this tool uses t for ත, th for ථ and T for ට. A Sinhala font is needed to read the result. Most phones and computers have one, and if you see empty boxes, install a font such as Noto Sans Sinhala. Have a native reader proof anything important.

Typing guide: every key and what it gives:
| You type | You get | Kind | Notes |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| a | අ (nothing added after a consonant) | Vowel | Short a. After a consonant it adds nothing: ක stays ක. |
| aa | ආ alone, කා after a consonant | Vowel | Long a. |
| ae | ඇ alone, කැ after a consonant | Vowel | As in the English word cat. |
| aae | ඈ alone, කෑ after a consonant | Vowel | Long version of ae. |
| i | ඉ alone, කි after a consonant | Vowel |  |
| ii | ඊ alone, කී after a consonant | Vowel | Long i. |
| u | උ alone, කු after a consonant | Vowel |  |
| uu | ඌ alone, කූ after a consonant | Vowel | Long u. |
| Ru | ඍ alone, කෘ after a consonant | Vowel | Vocalic r, in words from Sanskrit. A plain ru is රු. |
| Ruu | ඎ alone, කෲ after a consonant | Vowel | Long vocalic r. |
| e | එ alone, කෙ after a consonant | Vowel | Short e. |
| ee | ඒ alone, කේ after a consonant | Vowel | Long e. |
| ai | ඓ alone, කෛ after a consonant | Vowel |  |
| o | ඔ alone, කො after a consonant | Vowel | Short o. |
| oo | ඕ alone, කෝ after a consonant | Vowel | Long o. |
| au | ඖ alone, කෞ after a consonant | Vowel |  |
| k | ක | Consonant: Velar | The letter with its own a. With no vowel after it, k gives ක් (see the rules at the end of this table). |
| kh | ඛ | Consonant: Velar | Aspirated k. |
| g | ග | Consonant: Velar |  |
| gh | ඝ | Consonant: Velar | Aspirated g. |
| Ng | ඞ | Consonant: Velar | Rare. Used in a few Pali and Sanskrit words. |
| nG | ඟ | Consonant: Velar | Prenasalised g, as in මඟ. A plain nga is න්ග. |
| c | ච | Consonant: Palatal |  |
| ch | ච | Consonant: Palatal | Same letter as c. |
| chh | ඡ | Consonant: Palatal | Aspirated c. Ch does the same. |
| Ch | ඡ | Consonant: Palatal | Same as chh. |
| j | ජ | Consonant: Palatal |  |
| jh | ඣ | Consonant: Palatal | Aspirated j. |
| Nj | ඤ | Consonant: Palatal | Rare, in Pali words. |
| jn | ඥ | Consonant: Palatal | As in ඥානය. |
| T | ට | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Capital T is the retroflex t, as in මට. |
| Th | ඨ | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Aspirated retroflex t. |
| D | ඩ | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Capital D is the retroflex d, as in පාඩම. |
| Dh | ඪ | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Aspirated retroflex d. |
| N | ණ | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Capital N is the retroflex n. |
| nD | ඬ | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Prenasalised retroflex d. The plain pair n\Da gives න්ඩ. |
| L | ළ | Consonant: Retroflex (capital letters) | Capital L is the retroflex l. |
| t | ත | Consonant: Dental | Lowercase t is the dental t, as in තාත්තා. |
| th | ථ | Consonant: Dental | Aspirated t. Type t, not th, for ත. |
| d | ද | Consonant: Dental |  |
| dh | ධ | Consonant: Dental | Aspirated d. |
| n | න | Consonant: Dental |  |
| Nd | ඳ | Consonant: Dental | Prenasalised dental d. A plain nda is න්ද, as in සුන්දර. |
| p | ප | Consonant: Labial |  |
| ph | ඵ | Consonant: Labial | Aspirated p. |
| b | බ | Consonant: Labial |  |
| bh | භ | Consonant: Labial | Aspirated b. |
| m | ම | Consonant: Labial |  |
| mB | ඹ | Consonant: Labial | Prenasalised b, as in අඹ. A plain mba is ම්බ. |
| y | ය | Consonant: Other |  |
| r | ර | Consonant: Other |  |
| l | ල | Consonant: Other |  |
| v | ව | Consonant: Other |  |
| w | ව | Consonant: Other | Same letter as v. |
| sh | ශ | Consonant: Sibilants and h |  |
| S | ෂ | Consonant: Sibilants and h | Capital S is the retroflex sibilant, as in පුෂ්ප. |
| Sh | ෂ | Consonant: Sibilants and h | Same as S. |
| s | ස | Consonant: Sibilants and h |  |
| h | හ | Consonant: Sibilants and h |  |
| f | ෆ | Consonant: Sibilants and h |  |
| x | ං | Anusvara | Written after a letter, as in ලංකා (laxkaa). The letter before it keeps its own a. |
| H | ඃ | Visarga | Only after a letter, as in දුඃඛ (duHkha). At the start of a word, H is a plain h. |
| \ | (nothing) | Separator | Stops two keys joining. n\G is න්ග; a plain nG is ඟ. |
| kka | ක්ක | Rule | Hal kirima: a consonant followed by another consonant loses its a. |
| akka | අක්ක | Rule | A doubled consonant joins the same way, and so do clusters such as nd, ndh and mb. |
| andha | අන්ධ | Rule | ndh is n and dh, joined with hal kirima. |
| k | ක් | Rule | A consonant at the end of a word or before a space gets hal kirima. |
| kra | ක්‍ර | Rule | Rakaransaya: a consonant followed by r. |
| dya | ද්‍ය | Rule | Yansaya: a consonant followed by y. |
| karma | කර්‍ම | Rule | Repaya: r followed by a consonant. |
| kx | කං | Rule | Anusvara keeps the consonant's own a. |

Q: Why does amma give අම්ම and not අම්මා?
A: A single a is the short vowel. Singlish as people write it casually uses one a for both short and long sounds, and no tool can know which words end long. ammaa gives අම්මා, and aayuboowan gives ආයුබෝවන්.

Q: How do I type ත and ට?
A: Lowercase t is ත and capital T is ට. The aspirated letters are th for ථ and Th for ඨ. Some keyboards use th for ත, so if you are used to that, switch to t here.

Q: How do I type rakaransaya, yansaya and the ශ්‍රී in Sri Lanka?
A: Just type the letters. A consonant followed by r gives rakaransaya and followed by y gives yansaya. The invisible joiner is added for you. shrii gives ශ්‍රී and kra gives ක්‍ර.

Q: How do I type the anusvara in ලංකා?
A: Type x where the ං goes: laxkaa gives ලංකා and sixhala gives සිංහල. The visarga ඃ is a capital H after a letter: duHkha gives දුඃඛ.

Q: Do I need a Sinhala font?
A: Yes, to read the result. Most phones and computers include one. If you see empty boxes or question marks instead of letters, install a Sinhala font such as Noto Sans Sinhala. Text you copy is plain Unicode, so it keeps working in any app that supports Sinhala.

Q: Is my text sent anywhere?
A: No. The conversion runs in your browser as you type. Nothing is uploaded, stored or logged.

Q: Can I rely on the result for an important document?
A: Use it to type quickly, then have a native reader proof anything important. The converter follows fixed rules and does not know spelling, so it will happily write a word the way you typed it, correct or not.

Q: Does it match other Singlish keyboards?
A: Not exactly. Singlish has no single standard. For example, the Lexilogos phonetic keyboard uses a capital M for the anusvara where this tool uses x. This tool follows the table on this page, and text you paste from elsewhere passes through unchanged.

Sources: The Unicode Standard, chapter 13: Sinhala (al-lakuna, zero width joiner, repaya, yansaya and rakaransaya) (checked 13 October 2026) (https://www.unicode.org/versions/latest/core-spec/chapter-13/); Unicode code chart: Sinhala, U+0D80 to U+0DFF (https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U0D80.pdf); Sinhala script: conjuncts, hal kirima, anusvara, visarga and informal Sri Lankan romanisation (Wikipedia, checked 13 October 2026) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinhala_script); Lexilogos: Sinhala phonetic keyboard, an example of a different typing scheme (checked 13 October 2026) (https://www.lexilogos.com/keyboard/sinhala.htm)

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