arabic-design

Arabic Design — clean Arabic in AI-generated UI

Arabic is a cursive, connected script: letters join, and diacritics (ً ّ َ) sit above/below the baseline. Most AI-generated CSS is tuned for Latin type — and that's exactly what breaks Arabic. Apply these rules by default whenever the design contains Arabic; don't wait to be told.

Rule 1 — NEVER negative letter-spacing on Arabic (the #1 bug)

Latin design trends love tight tracking (letter-spacing: -0.02em). On Arabic, negative tracking overlaps the letter joins and crushes words into an unreadable blur. Positive tracking is just as wrong — it disconnects letters that must join.

/* ❌ WRONG — crushes connected letters into a blur */
h1 { letter-spacing: -1.5px; }        /* element contains Arabic */

/* ✅ RIGHT */
h1 { letter-spacing: normal; }        /* or 0 — always, for any element containing Arabic */

• Any element containing Arabic (or mixed Arabic+Latin) → letter-spacing: normal. Full stop.
• Negative/positive tracking is allowed only on pure-Latin/numeric elements (big stat numbers, $99, VS, all-caps Latin labels).

Rule 2 — Use a real Arabic font (never Latin-font fallback)

A Latin font with no Arabic glyphs silently falls back to a system font — mismatched weight, broken look. Always declare an Arabic-capable font explicitly, with a full stack:

/* pick one that matches the design's mood: */
font-family: "Cairo", "Tajawal", "IBM Plex Sans Arabic", "Noto Kufi Arabic", sans-serif;      /* modern UI */
font-family: "Almarai", "Rubik", "Baloo Bhaijaan 2", sans-serif;                              /* rounded/friendly */
font-family: "Noto Naskh Arabic", "Amiri", serif;                                             /* editorial/classic */

• Load the Arabic weights you actually use (400/700 at minimum).
• Never apply font-style: italic to Arabic (fake oblique breaks the script) and never rely on text-transform (Arabic has no case).

Rule 3 — Line-height must clear the diacritics

Bold display Arabic needs vertical room, or dots/diacritics collide with the line above.

Context	Safe line-height
Display headline (large, bold)	1.3
Mid headline	1.35
Body / captions	1.5–1.7

If unsure, go looser. Clipped diacritics are an instant "looks broken" tell.

Rule 4 — Direction & bidi (the "words are reversed" family of bugs)

• Set direction once at the root (<html dir="rtl"> for Arabic-first pages) — children inherit. Don't sprinkle dir attributes on every element.
• Use logical CSS properties so layout flips correctly: margin-inline-start, padding-inline-end, text-align: start — instead of margin-left, text-align: left.
• Wrap embedded Latin words/numbers inside Arabic text in an isolated span so the bidi algorithm doesn't reorder them:

  .ltr { display: inline-block; direction: ltr; }
  

  حدد أول <span class="ltr">MVP</span> قبل ما تبدأ
  

• The direction: ltr parent leak (root cause of reversed word order): layout containers set to direction: ltr for card/column order leak LTR into the Arabic text inside — so Marketplace مدمج renders as مدمج Marketplace. Fix: LTR only for layout order; every Arabic text block inside gets explicit direction: rtl.
• The الـ + Latin-word trap: never place the Arabic definite-article prefix (الـ, بالـ, للـ) immediately before an isolated Latin word — the detached letters jump to the wrong side. Drop the article (عبر CLI not عبر الـ CLI) or rephrase.
• Flip directional icons (arrows) in RTL contexts; a "next" arrow points left in Arabic UI.

Rule 5 — Punctuation & line breaks

• Use Arabic punctuation in Arabic sentences: ؟ not ?, ، not ,.
• If a ? or ، floats to the wrong side, the cause is almost always a straddling Latin token — wrap it in .ltr or rephrase so the sentence doesn't break mid-clause around it.
• When splitting a headline across lines, each line must continue the sentence naturally — Arabic readers read stacked lines as one flowing thought.

Rule 6 — Mobile legibility

Arabic letterforms are denser than Latin at the same px size. For social/mobile canvases (e.g. 1080px wide), keep body text ≥ ~36–40px and prefer heavier weights (600–800) for display text.

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Pre-ship checklist

1. No negative letter-spacing on any Arabic-containing selector:

   grep -nE "letter-spacing:\s*-" file.html
   

   Every hit must be pure-Latin/numeric. If it wraps Arabic → normal.
2. Every Arabic element has an explicit Arabic-capable font-family.
3. Display Arabic has line-height ≥ 1.3; body ≥ 1.5.
4. Embedded Latin words/numbers wrapped in .ltr; no الـ/بالـ/للـ directly before a Latin word:

   grep -noE "(الـ|بالـ|للـ) ?<?[A-Za-z]" file.html
   

5. No direction: ltr ancestor leaking into Arabic text blocks.
6. Render and look. Screenshot the result and inspect: letters connected (not crushed, not separated), diacritics not clipped, punctuation on the correct side, word order correct.