Read and write real code in your own language.
Most code is written with English words, a language most people do not speak. NADA shows your code in your own language, so you can read, write, and think in it.
Current status.
Each language starts from English, then grows until it covers the words used in code. 79 languages already cover more than 70 percent.
Usable in 130+ languages today.
One standard. Every language.
The same faithful, reversible rendering for every programming language — its keywords, standard library, and third-party library APIs, localized once and reused across all of them. A sample of what ships today, of 685 languages in scope, and growing:
Every legitimate programming language is in scope — surfaced as it crosses the coverage threshold. Logos are the official marks of their respective projects. Numbers localize too, in every native numeral script — see how →
Code is global. English is not.
About five in six people do not read English well. Almost all code is written in English. This means most people cannot read, learn from, or write real working code.
If you can read code, you can learn from it. If you can learn from it, you can write it.
def greet(name):
if name:
return f"Hello, {name}"परिभाषा greet(name):
अगर name:
वापसी f"Hello, {name}"Read and check the code AI writes for you.
Millions of people now ask AI to write code, and the number is rising. Many are writing code for the first time and cannot read what the AI produced. This is a real risk: when no one understands the code, mistakes, security flaws, and bugs reach real users. NADA shows the code in the reader’s own language, so they can read it, check it, and find problems before they cause harm. The more code people generate that they cannot read, the more this matters.
“I couldn’t read it, it was in a foreign language” is no longer a reason to skip the check.
Built so no company can own it.
A public standard that no single company controls, like Unicode, the W3C, and the IETF.
Built to be a digital public good: open data, open tools, works anywhere. This is our aim, not an official certificate.
Adopting NADA has compounding effects.
When people can read and write code in their own language, the benefits compound across security, skills, productivity, and economic growth.
-
A security multiplier.
AI now writes much of the code in use. When a workforce can read that code, more people can check what it does. NADA makes code readable to people who were previously excluded by language.
-
A literacy multiplier.
For many learners, the barrier to programming is not the logic. It is the English keywords they must learn first. Remove that barrier, and people can begin in a language they already know.
-
A productivity multiplier.
Developers who read and write code in their own language understand it faster, trust it more, and make fewer mistakes from misunderstanding.
-
An economy multiplier.
Programming is one of the most economically valuable skills. English kept most of the world's people from learning it. Making it available in more languages creates new developers, teachers, and economic growth.
A language survives by being used, including in code.
UNESCO measures a language's vitality partly by whether it reaches new domains. Of the world's roughly 7,000 languages, fewer than 100 are used in the digital world. Programming is a high-value modern skill, and it is almost entirely conducted in English. This exclusion is a leading driver of language decline.
of the world's ~7,000 languages are endangered. About one is lost every two weeks.
UNESCOlanguages are used in the digital world.
United Nationsof learners cannot access education in a language they understand (up to 90% in some countries).
UNESCO GEM Reportmore likely to read with understanding when taught in a language they speak.
UNESCOWhat NADA changes
NADA does not ask a community to invent a script or fork existing software. People read and write real, runnable code in their own language in the editor. The file on disk stays canonical English, so it runs everywhere and a student's work stays portable. A national or heritage language gains a foothold in computing at near-zero infrastructure cost.
There is a precedent. Unicode, a non-profit open standard now running on more than 20 billion devices, made the world's scripts representable on computers. NADA adds the next layer: making programming itself accessible. Public standards bodies have helped languages recover before, including te reo Māori, ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, Cymraeg, and Euskara. NADA is the equivalent standard for the vocabulary of code.
Three steps, no new policy required
- Recognise NADA localization of your national or heritage language as a digital-empowerment deliverable under your International Decade of Indigenous Languages (2022–2032) national action plan.
- Co-fund a community-led translation of the programming vocabulary into your language, stewarded through NADA, a neutral non-profit.
- Pilot it in your national digital-skills curriculum, as mother-tongue instruction.
NADA is one open, neutral tool, not a cure. Language survival takes immersion, transmission, institutions, and a community's decision to lead. NADA removes one specific barrier: it puts a language where technical work is done.
Get in touchBuild this with us.
NADA is a non-profit. It is a way for anyone to read and write code in their own language, including public-sector workers. Many workers already use AI to write code they cannot read. NADA lets them read it, which makes that work safer. We want to work with you, not sell you a product.
- A new way to learn technical skills, for everyone, including public-sector workers and students.
- Your workforce can read and check the AI code they produce every day.
- We can build your country’s school courses into the NADA app.
- Your courses can include AI help in your local language.
- For ministries of education and culture, NADA is also a tool for language revitalization and preservation. It gives your language new standing, new teaching materials, and economic reason to be used in software.
- We are looking for language experts and advisors for every language to help us get each one right.
We are looking for funders who support lasting public goods, not products.
Donations keep this work free: bringing more languages to full coverage, keeping the tools open, and keeping the standard independent of any company. For example, fully funding one regional language brings several more online at once.
We want a conversation, not a fixed amount.
chris@nadalang.org · governance memo on request.
Follow NADA's work.
Occasional updates on the language data, native-speaker review, and how governments and schools can take part.