How to convert Arabic numerals to English digits

Three kinds of digits

• Western digits: 0123456789.
• Arabic-Indic digits: ٠١٢٣٤٥٦٧٨٩, common in the Gulf and Egypt.
• Persian digits: ۰۱۲۳۴۵۶۷۸۹. They resemble Arabic-Indic, but 4, 5 and 6 differ in shape and in encoding.

That last difference causes a lot of hidden problems. Two numbers that look identical on screen can be different to a computer, so a search or a match fails. The tool handles all three kinds together.

Example

The Arabic text around the numbers stayed exactly the same. Only the shape of the digits changed, and their values are fully preserved.

How to do it

1. Open the Arabic/Persian/Western digit converter.
2. Paste or type your text.
3. Choose the target style, Western, Arabic-Indic or Persian, and which styles to convert from.
4. Copy the result or download it as a text file.

Decimal and thousands separators

This is exactly where many tools go wrong. The number 1,250.50 has a thousands comma and a decimal point, and changing either carelessly can change the value. So by default the tool leaves separators alone, and converting to Arabic-Indic gives ١,٢٥٠.٥٠ with the same separators. If you want the Arabic decimal separator, there is a separate option for it, with a note of how many separators will change.

Links and emails are protected

Convert a text containing a link, an email address or an IP address to Arabic digits and the link would break. The tool recognises those patterns and leaves them untouched. Links written without https:// or www may not be detected, so check the result if your text is full of links.

If your text needs extra spaces cleaned up before it goes into a sheet or form, run it through the Whitespace cleaner. To count its words and characters, use the Word and character counter.