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Learn Persian

Read the Persian script and speak everyday Farsi with confidence.

Free to start. Built from a single prompt. No credit card.

Persian, also called Farsi, is an Indo-European language, so it is a distant relative of English even though it is written right to left in a Perso-Arabic script. That script has 32 letters, the 28 of Arabic plus four for Persian sounds, پ, چ, ژ and گ, and short vowels are usually not written. Grammar is welcoming: no grammatical gender, the same pronoun for he and she, and regular verb endings. Persian links nouns and modifiers with a small vowel called the ezafe, as in ketāb-e man (my book), and builds many verbs with kardan (to do). Learnr builds a personalized Persian course from a single prompt and teaches it in short lessons.

How to learn Persian, step by step

Learn the script and how letters join. Learn each letter in its connected forms and the seven letters that never join to the next, such as ا, د, ر and و. Note that several letters share a sound, like ز, ذ, ض and ظ, which all sound like z.
Practice the vowels and new sounds. Persian has six vowels, and short ones are mostly unwritten. Practice خ (like Bach) and ق or غ, which many speakers pronounce the same, and the long ā in words like bābā.
Use the ezafe from the start. Link a noun with its adjective or owner using -e: ketāb-e bozorg (big book), khāne-ye man (my house). The ezafe is usually not written, so learn to hear and add it yourself.
Learn verbs through their two stems. Each verb has a present stem and a past stem, such as raft and rav from raftan (to go). Learn both, then add the personal endings for present (mi-ravam) and past (raftam).
Build vocabulary with compound verbs. Many verbs combine a noun or adjective with kardan or shodan: kār kardan (to work), tamām shodan (to finish). This lets you build new verbs quickly from words you already know.
Learn spoken Persian and practice daily. Spoken Tehrani Persian shortens many forms, so mikhāham becomes mikhām. Pair short daily Learnr lessons with Persian music, films and podcasts to hear both written and spoken styles.

What you'll learn

Read and write the Persian script and connect letters
Use the ezafe to link nouns, adjectives and possessors
Conjugate verbs from present and past stems
Use compound verbs with kardan and shodan
Understand spoken Tehrani Persian and polite expressions

What's inside your Persian course

A sample path Learnr builds for Persian. Your real course adapts to your goal and level.

1. The Persian alphabet and how letters connect
2. Sounds, short vowels and pronunciation
3. Greetings, pronouns and polite phrases
4. The ezafe and building noun phrases
5. Verbs, stems and compound verbs
6. Spoken Persian and everyday conversations

How long does it take to learn Persian?

The script takes a few weeks. Many learners hold basic conversations within a year of daily study, and comfortable fluency usually comes after a few years. Reading classical poetry, such as Hafez or Rumi, requires extra study of older vocabulary.

What you need before you start

No prior language is required. Knowing Arabic script helps with reading, and familiarity with Urdu or Arabic makes many loanwords recognizable.

Common mistakes to avoid

Learning only formal written Persian and then struggling to follow everyday speech, which shortens many verb forms.
Forgetting the ezafe, which makes noun phrases sound broken; practice adding it even though it is rarely written.
Assuming Persian is a dialect of Arabic because of the script, when its grammar is entirely different.

How Learnr builds your course

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Persian questions, answered

Is Persian the same as Farsi?

Yes. Farsi is the name for the language in Persian itself, while Persian is the English name. Dari in Afghanistan and Tajik in Tajikistan are closely related varieties.

Is Persian related to Arabic?

Not by family. Persian is Indo-European, related to Hindi and distantly to English, while Arabic is Semitic. Persian borrowed the script and many words from Arabic, but the grammar is different.