Estonian Keyboard Online – Free Virtual Eesti Klaviatuur
Free Online Estonian Keyboard – Type Estonian With õ, ä, ö and ü
Welcome to the Estonian keyboard online (eesti klaviatuur) — QWERTY with Estonian's own letters on dedicated keys, so you can write proper Estonian from any computer, tablet or phone with nothing to install. Click the keys on screen, or type on your physical keyboard.
Where the special letters sit. The keys right of P and L carry the vowels where an Estonian typist expects them: ü then õ follow P on the top row, ö then ä follow L on the home row. The two loanword letters take the spare keys — š at the end of the top row just past õ, and ž at the far left of the number row. Shift gives the capitals, and the digits stay put.
The Estonian alphabet runs to 32 letters: the basic Latin set plus š, z, ž, õ, ä, ö and ü, with c, q, w, x and y kept for foreign names. Length is meaningful in Estonian and is generally shown by doubling the letter, which is why everyday words look the way they do — kuu is 'moon', öö is 'night'.
õ is the letter that marks Estonian out. It is a back unrounded vowel — formed where o is formed, but with the lips relaxed — and few European languages have anything like it. You meet it constantly: õun 'apple', õpetaja 'teacher', mõte 'thought'. Writing o in its place is the quickest way to make Estonian text stop reading as Estonian.
š and ž are the rarest letters in the alphabet. Native words do not use them; they appear almost entirely in loanwords and foreign names — šokolaad 'chocolate', žanr 'genre', garaaž 'garage'. They are official letters all the same, and spelling them as plain s and z is a mistake rather than a shortcut.
Estonian is Finno-Ugric, not Baltic — a mix-up worth correcting. Estonia is grouped with Latvia and Lithuania as a Baltic state, but that is geography, not linguistics. Latvian and Lithuanian are Indo-European; Estonian belongs to the Finnic branch of the Uralic family, close to Finnish and distantly related to Hungarian. An Estonian follows a good deal of spoken Finnish and none of Lithuanian.
Related keyboards and privacy. Try the Finnish keyboard for Estonian's closest major relative, or the Latvian and Lithuanian keyboards for its Baltic neighbours. Everything runs locally in your browser — nothing you type is sent to a server, stored or logged — and Copy lifts the text out as plain Unicode.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I type õ on this keyboard?
Click the õ key, which sits on the top row immediately right of ü, just past P — the same position it occupies on a real Estonian keyboard. For the capital Õ, press Shift first or switch on Caps. If you would rather use your physical keyboard, the matching key is the one that types a closing square bracket on a US layout.
Where are š and ž?
They take the two spare keys the layout has left over. The š sits at the right-hand end of the top letter row, immediately past õ, and ž at the far left of the number row, just before the 1. Shift gives the capitals Š and Ž. Because both letters appear mostly in loanwords, this keeps them reachable without displacing anything you use constantly.
How does this differ from the official Estonian layout?
The vowel positions match Estonia's standard layout exactly — ü and õ after P, ö and ä after L. The difference is š and ž: on a physical Estonian keyboard those are typed by holding AltGr with s and z. An on-screen keyboard has no meaningful AltGr, so they are given keys of their own instead. Punctuation follows US positions.
Are the numbers where I expect them?
Yes. Unlike the Latvian and Lithuanian layouts, where some letters have to borrow digit keys and push those digits onto Shift, Estonian needs no such compromise. The digits 1 through 0 stay in their normal places. Only the spare key at the left-hand end of the row, which now carries ž, has been reassigned.
Will my Estonian text paste correctly into other apps?
Yes. Every character produced here is standard Unicode, so õ, ä, ö, ü, š and ž survive intact when you paste into Word, Google Docs, Gmail, Slack, a browser form or a database. No special font or encoding is needed on the receiving end — these are ordinary letters that every modern system already understands.
What is the difference between ö and õ?
They are separate letters with different sounds. The ö is a front rounded vowel, much like German ö; the õ is a back vowel made with unrounded lips and has no close equivalent in German, English or the Nordic languages. Swapping one for the other changes the word, so the distinction matters in writing.
Is Estonian related to Latvian and Lithuanian?
No. Despite all three countries being called Baltic states, Estonian is a Finno-Ugric language of the Uralic family, while Latvian and Lithuanian form the Baltic branch of Indo-European. Estonian's real relatives are Finnish, Karelian, Võro and, much further off, Hungarian. The shared label is political geography rather than language family.
How many letters does the Estonian alphabet have?
Thirty-two. The core set is the Latin alphabet plus š, z, ž, õ, ä, ö and ü. The letters c, q, w, x and y are officially part of the alphabet but appear only in foreign names and unassimilated loanwords, which is why they sit in their ordinary QWERTY positions on this keyboard.
Is this Estonian keyboard free, and does it work on phones?
It is completely free, with no account, no installation and no usage limit. The layout is responsive, so it works on iPhone, iPad and Android as well as on desktop. Advertising is what keeps it free. You can also switch to the typing speed test to practise Estonian text at your own pace.
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