Check the quality of your Swahili translation

Swahili alphabet and characters

The Swahili alphabet should display only the following characters. If your document is not showing correctly, then first check that the encoding for that program and font supports Swahilian.

Swahili characters (alphabet)

Swahili grammar rules

Swahili nouns are distinctive by prefixes and are grouped in 15 classes. Nouns are not distinctive by gender.

Nouns agree with adjectives, numberals, demonstratives, possesives and relatives by the use of affixes.

Three are two numbers: singular and plural.

Swahili formatting rules

RegionTanzanian
Short date formatdd/MM/yy
e.g. 17/03/16
Long date formatdd MMMM, yyyy
e.g. 17 Machi, 2016

Swahili capitalisation usage

  • People’s names.
  • Geographical names (of countries, counties/states, cities etc.).
  • Headings/titles: only the first word is capitalised unless a proper noun is featured
  • Names of states, unions, federations.

Solutions for Swahili

Stepping Stone provides translation and localisation services for Swahili