Russian handwriting

Every Russian learner at some moment realizes that even if you have learned Russian alphabet by heart, it does not guarantee that you will be able to read hand-written Russian.

Russian handwriting can be quite confusing as many of the letters don’t look as their printed versions. Some of them look completely different from their English equivalents, others look the same but are used for completely different letters.

Below, you can find the list of Russian letters in printed and hand-written formats and some exercise to practice.

To practice hand-written Russian yourself, you can download our PDF worksheets:
– Full hand-written Russian alphabet
– Example sentences in Russian
or many others in our Practice section.

Handwritten Russian alphabet

Click on any letter to see its detailed description and practice it with syllables and words.

Printed	Hand-written v.1	Hand-written v.2	Transcription
А a	А a		[ a ]
Б б	Б б		[ b ]
В в	В в		[ v ]
Г г	Г г		[ g ]
Д д	Д д		[ d ]
Е е	Е е		[ ye ]
Ё ё	Ё ё		[ yo ]
Ж ж	Ж ж		[ zh ]
З з	З з		[ z ]
И и	И и		[ ee ]
Й й	Й й		[ ï ]
К к	К к		[ k ]
Л л	Л л		[ l ]
М м	М м		[ m ]
Н н	Н н		[ n ]
О о	О о		[ o ]
П п	П п		[ p ]
Р р	Р р		[ r ]
С с	С с		[ s ]
Т т	Т т		[ t ]
У у	У у		[ u ]
Ф ф	Ф ф		[ f ]
Х х	Х х		[ kh ]
Ц ц	Ц ц		[ ts ]
Ч ч	Ч ч		[ ch ]
Ш ш	Ш ш		[ sh ]
Щ щ	Щ щ		[ shch ]
ъ	ъ		[ ]
ы	ы		[ y ]
ь	ь		[ ' ]
Э э	Э э		[ e ]
Ю ю	Ю ю		[ yu ]
Я я	Я я		[ ya ]

You can download this table as PDF.

Practice to read Russian writing

To help you with the task of decoding Russian writings, we offer an exercise: below are some basic and useful Russian phrases that are written by hand with their printed versions and translation. Study them carefully trying to recognize each of the letters.

Привет, как дела?
Hi, how are you?

Доброе утро!
Good morning!

Какая сегодня хорошая погода!
What a nice weather today!

Сколько это стоит?
How much is it?

Вы не подскажете, где здесь туалет?
Can you tell me where the toilet is?

Где ближайший ресторан?
Where is the nearest restaurant?

Как пройти на улицу Маяковского?
How to get to Mayakovsky Street?

Как тебя зовут?
What’s your name?

Сколько времени? – Без пяти девять.
What time is it? – Five to nine.

Извините, вы выходите на следующей?
Excuse, are you getting off at the next stop?

Кто последний в очереди?
Who is the last in the queue?

Простите, что вы сказали?
Excuse me, what did you say?

You can download these sentences as PDF.