Native construction order
The word ស្ត្រី is built one action at a time: ស, then ជើងត, then a second stacked ជើងរ, then the vowel ី. Stacked subscripts are just more taps — you never hold two keys at once.
US ANSI / QWERTY
Left ShiftSubscriptsRight ShiftVowelsLeft AltSignsRight AltMore vowelsCaps LockMore consonants0–9Khmer numbers ០–៩
Tap once, type one character, then return to Consonants. Tap the same key again for the next page of that family. Press Esc to cancel.
Consonants
Why this keyboard
Khmer Writer keeps the language model Khmer-first: meaningful actions above Unicode mechanics.
Native construction order
ស្ត្រី
Unicode stays underneath
Writer outputs normal Unicode Khmer for copy, paste, search, and publishing. The editor simply removes encoding order from the user's mental workload.
One spatial home
A consonant and its ជើង share the same physical position across layouts. The hand learns one home for each consonant family.
Smart, but predictable
The keyboard may highlight valid paths and return from one-shot pages, but it never guesses a user's intended word or silently changes learned key meanings.
How typing flows
Stay on consonants. There are no Shift+key or Alt+key combinations to hold — tap a page key, tap the character, and Writer returns home.
Tap, never chord
Writer has no Shift+key or Alt+key combinations to memorise. Tap one page key to arm it, release, then tap the character. Tap the same page key again to step through that family — never two keys at once.
Instead of holding ⇧+A:⇧+AL⇧A
Home01
Consonants
This is home. Type the base consonant, and the keyboard remains here.
Try:Kក
Left Shift02
Subscripts
Tap Left Shift, then the consonant key — it becomes the matching subscript. Want a second subscript stacked underneath? Tap Left Shift again and type the next consonant.
Try:SL⇧TL⇧Rស្ត្រ
Right Shift03
Vowels
Tap Right Shift, then a vowel. Combined forms like ាំ, ើ and េះ are single keys on this page — one tap types the whole form.
Try:DR⇧Wដាំ
Left Alt04
Signs
Tap Left Alt for everyday signs. Space on this page inserts an invisible word boundary (zero-width space) so long Khmer text wraps at word edges. Tap Left Alt again to step through historical signs, Lek Attak, and lunar dates — or use the named page menu.
Try:KL⌥Nកំ
Right Alt05
More vowels
Tap Right Alt for the rarer independent vowels; tap it again to step to historical vowels.
Try:R⌥Tឫ
Caps Lock06
More consonants
Tap Caps Lock for supplementary loanword consonants such as ហ្គ and ហ្វ; tap again for historical letters.
Try:CapsGហ្គ
One character, then home
After the next character, Writer returns to Consonants automatically.
Same key steps pages, Esc cancels
Tap the same Shift or Alt key again to step to that family's next page — after the last page it returns to Consonants. Press Esc at any time to cancel back to Consonants.
Word suggestions while you type
A small dictionary popup follows your writing — like code completion in an editor. It only ever appends the rest of a word; your typed text is never rewritten.
សួTab / ⏎សួស្តី
One Tab or Enter finishes the word
Type សួ and the popup offers សួស្តី (hello). Press Tab or Enter and the rest of the word is inserted for you.
Your keys, your choice
Tab or Enter inserts the highlighted word, ↑↓ choose another, Esc hides the popup until you type again. Prefer no suggestions? Turn them off any time with the Suggestions toggle under the editor.
A dictionary that grows
Missing a word? Use “Suggest a word” under the editor. Approved words join everyone's dictionary.
Four ways to learn the same Khmer
Every layout uses the same pages and composition rules. Only the physical positions change.
Phonetic
Maps Khmer sounds to familiar QWERTY anchors: K → ក, M → ម, R → រ. A/E/I/O/U anchor both basic and combined vowel sounds, while supplementary forms stay with their nearest sound family.
Best for: new users who remember by sound
Kក
Mម
Rរ