Help:Multilingual support for Android

Not all Android devices come with a complete set of Unicode fonts.

If you wish to install additional fonts, you will likely need to root your device.

Check

The following sections will let you check to see what scripts are installed properly on your device.

Alphabets

Latin: If you're reading this, you already have Latin installed on your device.

Script	Correct rendering	Your computer
Cyrillic		Кирилица
Greek		Ελληνικό
Georgian		ქართული
Armenian		Հայերեն
Arabic		أبجدية عربية
Hebrew		אלפבית עברי

Other

Script	Correct rendering	Your computer
Ethiopic		ግዕዝ ፊደል
Thaana		ތާނަ އަލިފުބާގެ ތަރުތީބު

Indic

Script
Script	Correct rendering	Your computer
Devanagari		क + ि → कि
Tamil		க + ே → கே
Gujarati		ક + િ → કિ
Gurmukhi		ਕ + ਿ → ਕਿ
Kannada		ಕ + ಿ → ಕಿ
Telugu		య + ీ → యీ
Bengali, Assamese		ক + ি → কি
Malayalam		ക + െ → കെ
Tibetan		ར + ྐ + ྱ → རྐྱ
Sinhala		ඵ + ේ → ඵේ
Odia		କ + େ → କେ
Thai		ฐ + ู → ฐู
Lao		ກ + ົ + ້ → ກົ້
Khmer		ម + ្ + ស + ៅ → ម្សៅ
Burmese		ဃ + ြ → ဃြ
Javanese		ꦧ + ꦾ + ꦺ + ꦴ + ꦂ → ꦧꦾꦺꦴꦂ
Balinese		ᬩ + ᭄ + ᬬ + ᬾ + ᬵ + ᬃ → ᬩ᭄ᬬᭀᬃ
Sundanese		ᮘ + ᮡ + ᮦ + ᮁ → ᮘᮡᮦᮁ

East Asian

Script	Correct rendering	Your computer
Traditional Chinese		人人生來自由，在尊嚴和權利上一律平等。他們有理性和良心，請以手足關係的精神相對待。
Simplified Chinese		人人生来自由，在尊严和权利上一律平等。他们有理性和良心，请以手足关系的精神相对待。
Japanese		すべての人間は、生まれながらにして自由であり、かつ、尊厳と権利とについて平等である。人間は、理性と良心とを授けられており、互いに同胞の精神をもって行動しなければならない。
Korean		모든 인간은 태어날 때부터 자유로우며 그 존엄과 권리에 있어 동등하다. 인간은 천부적으로 이성과 양심을 부여받았으며 서로 형제애의 정신으로 행동하여야 한다.

Keyboards

If you plan to use multiple languages in Android, or to edit articles on Wikipedia on foreign languages that require scripts, chances are you will need to install a new keyboard, that can easily switch between settings without forcing you to return to settings. Fortunately, there are several free keyboards available for Android which will allow you to do this.

AnySoft Keyboard by Menny Even
Gboard by Google
Keyman by SIL International
MultiLing Keyboard by Han Honso
MultiLingual Keyboard by Amidos
SwiftKey Keyboard by Microsoft

There are also several other free multilingual keyboards which come with experimental input methods:

Hacker's Keyboard by Klaus Weidner

Comparison

Comparison of native support and available plugins for each keyboard. Note that not all plugins may work without installing a suitable font.

Alphabet	EazyType	Language	AnySoft	Go	Han Honso ML	Amidos ML	Adaptxt	Hacker's	Slide IT
Latin	Azerbaijani	---	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	---	---
	French	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
	German	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
	Spanish	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
	Indonesian	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
	Turkish	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
	Vietnamese	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Cyrillic	Russian	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
	Bulgarian	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	Plugin	---
	Ukrainian	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native	---	---	Plugin	---
Greek		Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	Plugin	---
Georgian		Plugin Requires font	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	Native Requires font	---	---	---	---
Armenian		Plugin Requires font	---	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Arabic	Plugin	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	Plugin	---
	Farsi	Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	Plugin	---
	Urdu	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	Plugin	---
Hebrew	Hebrew	---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Hebrew	Yiddish	---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Ethiopic	Amharic	---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Thaana	Dhivehi	---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Korean		---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Japanese		---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Chinese (Simplified)		---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Chinese (Traditional)		---	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Yi		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Devangari	Hindi	Plugin Requires font	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Devangari	Marathi	---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Bengali		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Gujarati		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font Dictionary plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Gurmukhi	Punjabi	---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Oriya		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Sinhala		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Kannada		Plugin Requires font	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Malayalam		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Tamil		Plugin Requires font	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Telugu		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Tibetan		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Burmese		---	---	---	---	---	---	---	---
Khmer		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Lao		Plugin Requires font	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---
Thai		Plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary plugin	Native Keyboard Dictionary Plugin	---	---	---	---	---
Canadian Aboriginal		---	---	Native Keyboard Requires font	---	---	---	---	---

Fonts

Chances are that your Android device will include Latin, Cyrillic, Arabic and most East-Asian fonts (except Yi), as well as Greek, Thai and Hebrew, meaning that you will be able to read, and once you have a proper keyboard, to write, languages spoken by a majority of the world's population.

However the large majority of the world's scripts are unsupported, including all Indic scripts except Thai (collectively covering India, Sri Lanka, Burma, Cambodia, and Laos as well as Yi, Ge'ez, Thaana, Georgian, Armenian, and Canadian Aboriginal. While all of these alphabets except Burmese have keyboards available, they won't work unless you have the correct fonts.

And many Android devices (such as the Galaxy Tab mentioned above) do not allow you to install fonts, which will make things difficult for you. To install fonts on such devices, you will have to root them, before installing fonts. Detailed rooting instructions can be found here. Keep in mind that rooting your phone will format it, which means that it is very important to back-up your data prior to rooting.

Once your device is open, you will be able to install true-type fonts directly on your device, or use an installer from Android, such as this one for Georgian. Alternatively, you can also copy the font file into /system/fonts folder, then you edit /system/etc/fallback_fonts.xml to make your font work with many Android apps.