[13] Gurmukhi is derived from Sharada in the Northwestern group, of which it is the only major surviving member,[14] with full modern currency.

From the 10th century onwards, regional differences started to appear between the Sharada script used in Punjab, the Hill States (partly Himachal Pradesh) and Kashmir.

Sharada proper was eventually restricted to very limited ceremonial use in Kashmir, as it grew increasingly unsuitable for writing the Kashmiri language.

[26] The regional variety in Punjab continued to evolve from this stage through the 14th century; during this period it starts to appear in forms closely resembling Gurmukhī and other Landa scripts.

By the 15th century, Sharada had evolved so considerably that epigraphists denote the script at this point by a special name, Dēvāśēṣa.

It was through its recording in Gurmukhi that knowledge of the pronunciation and grammar of the Old Punjabi language (c. 10th–16th century) was preserved for modern philologists.

The Takri alphabet developed through the Dēvāśēṣa stage of the Sharada script from the 14th-18th centuries[26] and is found mainly in the Hill States such as Chamba, Himachal Pradesh and surrounding areas, where it is called Chambeali.

[28] The local Takri variants got the status of official scripts in some of the Punjab Hill States, and were used for both administrative and literary purposes until the 19th century.

[22] Also playing a major role in consolidating and standardizing the Punjabi language, it served as the main medium of literacy in Punjab and adjoining areas for centuries when the earliest schools were attached to gurdwaras.

[33] The Singh Sabha Movement of the late 19th century, a movement to revitalize Sikh institutions which had declined during colonial rule after the fall of the Sikh Empire, also advocated for the usage of the Gurmukhi script for mass media, with print media publications and Punjabi-language newspapers established in the 1880s.

[37] Although the word Gurmukhī has been commonly translated as "from the Mouth of the Guru", the term used for the Punjabi script has somewhat different connotations.

[46] Tones in Punjabi can be either rising, neutral, or falling:[6][47] The letters now always represent unaspirated consonants, and are unvoiced in onset positions and voiced elsewhere.

These are used most often for loanwords,[6] though not exclusively,[note 4] and their usage is not always obligatory: The letter ਸ਼, already in use by the time of the earliest Punjabi grammars produced, along with ਜ਼ and ਲ਼,[49] enabled the previously unmarked distinction of /s/ and the well-established phoneme /ʃ/, which is used even in native echo doublets e.g. rō̆ṭṭī-śō̆ṭṭī "stuff to eat"; the loansounds f, z, x, and ġ as distinct phonemes are less well-established,[50] decreasing in that order and often dependent on exposure to Hindi-Urdu norms.

[51] It was not a part of the traditional orthography, as the distinctive phonological difference between /lə/ and /ɭə/, while both native sounds,[27] was not reflected in the script,[25] and its inclusion is still not currently universal.

[43] Other characters, like the more recent [ਕ਼] /qə/,[51] are also on rare occasion used unofficially, chiefly for transliterating old writings in Persian and Urdu, the knowledge of which is less relevant in modern times.

In addition to the three standard subscript letters, another subscript character representing the subjoined /j/, the yakaśă or pairī̃ yayyā ( ੵ U+0A75), is utilized specifically in archaized sahaskritī-style writings in Sikh scripture, where it is found 268 times[58] for word forms and inflections from older phases of Indo-Aryan,[59] as in the examples ਰਖੵਾ /ɾəkʰːjaː/ "(to be) protected", ਮਿਥੵੰਤ /mɪt̪ʰjən̪t̪ə/ "deceiving", ਸੰਸਾਰਸੵ /sənsaːɾəsjə/ "of the world", ਭਿਖੵਾ /pɪ̀kʰːjaː/ "(act of) begging", etc.

Independent vowels are constructed using the three vowel-bearing characters:[6] ੳ ūṛā , ਅ aiṛā, and ੲ īṛī.

[22] Consonant length is distinctive in the Punjabi language and the use of this diacritic can change the meaning of a word, as below: It has not been standardized to be written in all instances of gemination;[61] there is a strong tendency, especially in rural dialects, to also geminate consonants following a long vowel (/a:/, /e:/, /i:/, /o:/, /u:/, /ɛ:/, /ɔː/, which triggers shortening in these vowels) in the penult of a word, e.g. ਔਖਾ aukkhā "difficult", ਕੀਤੀ kī̆ttī "did", ਪੋਤਾ pō̆ttā "grandson", ਪੰਜਾਬੀ panjā̆bbī "Punjabi", ਹਾਕ hākă "call, shout", but plural ਹਾਕਾਂ hā̆kkā̃.

[note 8] Except in this case, where this unmarked gemination is often etymologically rooted in archaic forms,[63] and has become phonotactically regular,[64] the usage of the áddakă is obligatory.

[68] Before the 1970s, Gurbani and other Sikh scriptures were written in the traditional scriptio continua method of writing the Gurmukhi script known as ਲੜੀਵਾਰ laṛīvāră, where there were no spacing between words in the texts.

This is opposed to the comparatively more recent method of writing in Gurmukhi known as padă chēdă, which breaks the words by inserting spacing between them.

[69][70][71] First line of the Guru Granth Sahib, the Mul Mantar, in laṛīvāră (continuous form) and padă chēdă (spaced form):[72] laṛīvāră: ੴਸਤਿਨਾਮੁਕਰਤਾਪੁਰਖੁਨਿਰਭਉਨਿਰਵੈਰੁਅਕਾਲਮੂਰਤਿਅਜੂਨੀਸੈਭੰਗੁਰਪ੍ਰਸਾਦਿ॥ padă chēdă: ੴ ਸਤਿ ਨਾਮੁ ਕਰਤਾ ਪੁਰਖੁ ਨਿਰਭਉ ਨਿਰਵੈਰੁ ਅਕਾਲ ਮੂਰਤਿ ਅਜੂਨੀ ਸੈਭੰ ਗੁਰ ਪ੍ਰਸਾਦਿ ॥ Transliteration: ikku ōaṅkāru sati nāmu karatā purakhu nirapàu niravairu akāla mūrati ajūnī saipàṅ gura prasādi Various historical styles and fonts, or ਸ਼ੈਲੀ śailī, of Gurmukhi script have evolved and been identified.

Punjabi University Patiala has developed label generation rules for validating international domain names for internet in Gurmukhi.