Arabic–English Dictionary Apps That Show the Root

What is the best Arabic–English dictionary app for a learner?

The one that does the steps you cannot yet do. Hans Wehr is the standard reference but is ordered by root, so you must find the root first. Aratools and Qamoos accept a typed word and show its root. A reader with a built-in dictionary, such as Fasaha, takes the word as written in the text and returns its meaning, root and pattern.

Why are Arabic dictionaries ordered by root?

Most Arabic words are built from a root, usually three consonants that carry a core meaning, set into a pattern that says what kind of word it is. The root ك ت ب has to do with writing: كَتَبَ kataba is “he wrote”, كِتَاب kitāb “book”, كَاتِب kātib “writer”, مَكْتَب maktab “office” and مَكْتُوب maktūb “written”.

Arabic lexicographers have filed words by root since the first dictionaries, and the standard modern dictionary for learners does the same. Hans Wehr’s Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, first published in German in 1952 and in J Milton Cowan’s English edition in 1961, arranges its entries according to the traditional Arabic root order.

The arrangement teaches as you use it: open the entry for one word and its whole family is on the page. The cost falls on the beginner, who has to know the root before finding the word.

The three steps hidden in one lookup

Take وَسَيَكْتُبُونَهَا, one written word that means “and they will write it”. To look it up you first remove what is attached: وَ “and”, سَـ “will”, the يَـ and ـُونَ that mark “they”, and ـهَا “it”. What remains points to the root ك ت ب.

The second step is the root itself, and weak letters make it treacherous. The letters و and ي, and the hamza, change or vanish inside words. قُلْ “say” shows two letters; its root is ق و ل. مِيزَان “scale” shows a ي; its root is و ز ن. A learner who searches under the letters on the page finds nothing.

The third step is choosing. Arabic is normally printed without short vowels, so one spelling can be several words: علم can be ʿilm, “knowledge”, ʿalam, “flag”, or ʿalima, “he knew”. Only the sentence decides. A dictionary that sees the word alone can list the candidates; a dictionary that sees the sentence can rank them.

How to find the root of a word you do not know

The traditional method still works and is worth learning, because it is also how you read without a dictionary.

The eight words in this guide each break one of these rules of thumb. They are the reason the method takes months to become quick.

• Remove prefixes that are not part of the word: وَ and فَ (and, so), بِ and لِ and كَ (with, for, like), ال (the), سَـ (will).
• Remove endings: attached pronouns such as ـهُ and ـهَا and ـهُمْ and ـكَ and ـنَا, and the plural and dual endings ـُونَ and ـِينَ and ـَات and ـَانِ.
• Remove the letters that patterns add: a leading مـ or تـ or أ, a doubled middle letter, a long vowel between root letters.
• If only two letters remain, a weak letter has dropped out. Try a و or a ي first, in the middle, then last.
• Look up the three letters. If the family does not fit your sentence, try the other candidate.

What each kind of dictionary does for you

Dictionary tools for Arabic fall into four kinds, by how much of that work they take on. The table in this guide states what each one’s own page or store listing said on 10 October 2026.

Root-ordered references, in print or digitised, are the most complete and expect you to arrive with the root. Hans Wehr covers modern written Arabic. Lane’s Arabic–English Lexicon, eight volumes published between 1863 and 1893 and drawn from the medieval Arabic dictionaries, covers the classical language and was never completed.

Search dictionaries such as Almaany take a typed word and return translations. Morphological dictionaries such as Aratools and Qamoos also show the root. Reader dictionaries start from the text: you tap the word where it stands.

What should a learner’s dictionary show?

Start from reading, because that is where the unknown words are. For the exact word in front of you, a learner’s dictionary should give the meaning that fits this sentence, the dictionary form you would search for, the root and the pattern, a recording, and the relatives you may already know. It should accept the word with everything attached.

Coverage is the test that separates such tools, and few publish it. We measured ours. On 214,689 words of real Arabic, drawn from learner articles, stories, subtitles, a classical book and Arabic Wikipedia, a tap in Fasaha opened a dictionary entry for 96.03% of words, measured on 3 September 2026. Most misses were names, foreign words and words the dictionary does not yet hold.

Where Fasaha fits, and where it does not

Fasaha’s dictionary sits inside everything you read in the app and can also be searched directly, in Arabic or by meaning. Counted on 10 October 2026, it holds more than 27,000 entries and 37,000 senses on about 4,200 roots, with meanings in 14 languages: English, Russian, Turkish, Uzbek, Spanish, French, German, Indonesian, Malay, Urdu, Italian, Portuguese, Bengali and Kazakh. It works offline once its data is on the device.

It is a learner’s dictionary. Hans Wehr and Lane hold far more words and far more senses, and a student of classical texts will still want them. It does not replace the Quranic Arabic Corpus for word-by-word grammar of the Qurʼan either. What it does is take the three steps out of ordinary reading, so that a lookup costs a second and you stay in the sentence.

Eight words that hide their root

Each is filed under letters you cannot all see on the page. Cover the note, guess the root, then check.

1. A و written as ي: مِيزَان — scale, balance
2. The middle letter dropped: قُلْ — say
3. The first letter dropped: يَعِدُ — he promises
4. A noun with two root letters showing: ثِقَة — trust
5. A و merged into an added ت: اِتَّصَلَ — he got in touch
6. Three added letters in front: مُسْتَشْفًى — hospital
7. A و that became ت: تُرَاث — heritage
8. An added ت hidden in a doubled letter: اِدَّعَى — he claimed

Is there a Hans Wehr app?

Yes. Hans Wehr Digital, on the App Store, is a digitised edition with search and verb-form highlighting, and other apps and websites show the scanned pages. They are the same root-ordered dictionary, so you still need the root or a tool that finds it for you.

How do I look up an Arabic word if I do not know the root?

Use a tool that accepts the word as written. Aratools and Qamoos take a typed word and show its root; Fasaha takes a tap on the word in a text. To do it by hand, remove prefixes and endings, remove the letters a pattern adds, and restore a dropped و or ي.

Why can I not find a word in Hans Wehr?

Usually because it is filed under a root you did not expect. Weak letters change or disappear, and prefixes look like root letters. مِيزَان is under و ز ن, not under م.

Which dictionary is best for Qurʼanic Arabic?

The Quranic Arabic Corpus, free online, gives the morphology, root and grammar of every word in the Qurʼan. For senses in classical usage, Lane’s Lexicon remains the reference in English.

Do Arabic dictionary apps work offline?

Some do. Almaany’s app says it works offline with summarised results, and Fasaha’s dictionary works offline once its data is on the device. Several listings do not say, so check before you rely on one.

Does Fasaha replace Hans Wehr?

For reading, it is faster. For exhaustive study of a root, no: Hans Wehr holds more words and more senses. Many learners keep both.

Sources

• Wikipedia, Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic (Hans Wehr; root order; editions)
• Wikipedia, Arabic–English Lexicon (Edward William Lane; eight volumes, 1863 to 1893)
• Quranic Arabic Corpus, University of Leeds (morphology, syntax and root of every word in the Qurʼan)
• Aratools Arabic-English on the App Store (part of speech and root; over 80,000 stems), read 10 October 2026
• Qamoos Arabic Dictionary on the App Store (root, related words, verb measure), read 10 October 2026
• Hans Wehr Digital on the App Store (digitised Hans Wehr with verb-form highlighting), read 10 October 2026
• Almaany English–Arabic dictionary on the App Store (offline use with summarised results), read 10 October 2026
• Fasaha, “Should you look up every Arabic word?” (lookup coverage measured on 214,689 words, 3 September 2026)

About Fasaha

Fasaha is a reading-first Arabic app. Every word in a story, a podcast, a video or an article opens into its meaning, root, pattern and family, and can be saved for spaced review.

• Available on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Android.
• Interface languages: English, Arabic, Turkish, Russian, Uzbek, Spanish, French, German, Indonesian, Malay, Urdu, Italian, Portuguese, Bengali and Kazakh.
• Free to start; Premium opens the complete library and the stores handle billing.
• Dictionary counted on 10 October 2026: more than 27,000 entries and 37,000 senses on about 4,200 roots, with meanings in 14 languages.

All posts

• Should you look up every Arabic word? What the research says: The usual advice is to guess from context and keep reading. In one study, guesses were fully right a quarter of the time. What the numbers mean for Arabic, and a two-pass routine that decides which words to look up.
• ك·ت·ب: one root, twelve words: If you learned كِتَاب as a flashcard, you learned one word. If you learned it as ك·ت·ب plus a pattern, you learned a family.