About Arabic Word By Word

Arabic Word By Word is a free, no-signup tool for reading Arabic text — typed documents, scanned books, PDFs, photos of pages, or spoken Arabic audio — one word at a time. Upload anything with Arabic text or speech in it, and every word becomes clickable: tap a word to see its meaning instantly, or select a whole sentence to see it translated all at once.

Why we built this

Most Arabic learners hit the same wall: they can sound out the words, but stopping to look up every unfamiliar one in a separate dictionary app breaks the flow of actually reading. Arabic Word By Word keeps you inside the text — the translation is one tap away, right where the word is.

What makes it different

• Works with typed text, PDFs, Word documents, and photos of pages (automatic text recognition for scanned or handwritten-looking Arabic, including harakat/diacritics). Free by default; an optional Google Cloud Vision mode gives higher accuracy if you bring your own Google API key.
• Also works with audio — upload a recording and it's transcribed automatically, so you can read along and tap words while it plays. Free by default; an optional ElevenLabs mode gives higher accuracy if you bring your own ElevenLabs API key.
• Translates into any of the 130+ languages Google Translate supports, not just English.
• Click a single word for its dictionary meaning, or select a full sentence for a natural, sentence-level translation.
• Save words you're learning to "My Cards" for later review — stored right in your browser, no account needed.
• Completely free. No login, no paywall, no limits on how much you read.

Who it's for

Students working through Arabic textbooks, readers of the Qur'an or classical Arabic texts, anyone trying to get through a PDF or scanned book in Arabic without a translation, and learners at any level who want to read real Arabic instead of graded textbook sentences.

Try it now — upload a file