Display the active keyboard layout in waybar

[yuters]

2025-07-09_22-06-51.mp4

If you have not yet setup your keyboard layouts, please look at this FAQ first:
https://manuals.omamix.org/2/the-omarchy-manual/67/faq#how-do-i-switch-between-keyboard-layouts

Now edit your ~/.config/waybar/config.jsonc file, and add the new module.

...
"modules-right": [
  "hyprland/language",
  ...
],
"hyprland/language": {
  "format": "{}",
  "format-en": "US",
  "format-ca(fr)": "FR-CA"
}
...

Your country code and/or language format in the key name "format-{code}" must be the same as you previously set.

Now change the ~/.config/waybar/style.css to include:

...,
#language {
  min-width: 12px;
  margin: 0 7.5px;
}

Then restart waybar and here you go!

pkill waybar && hyprctl dispatch exec waybar

[yuters]

You can also switch keyboard by adding this on-click command:

"hyprland/language": {
  "format": "{}",
  "format-en": "US",
  "format-ca(fr)": "FR-CA",
+ "on-click": "hyprctl switchxkblayout your-keyboard-name-here next"
}

You can find your keyboard name by running hyprctl devices

[marcinczenko]

It would be nice to preserve those settings during migrations - they are overwritten after updating Waybar from the Omarchy Update menu.

[marcinczenko]

I see that a .bak file is created - thus, that's probably enough for now. Perhaps pulling those settings from kb_layout in ~/.config/hypr/hyprland.conf could be even nicer.

[yuters]

I'm sure there will eventually be a better way to handle migrations since this issue is often mentioned. In the meantime you could track the files with git.

[AllTradesz]

For those who may want cycling between the US and US-INTL keyboard setups, this is what I got to work..
hyprland.conf:

input {
  # Use multiple keyboard layouts and switch between them with Alt + Space
  kb_layout = us,us  #PR: layout count needs to match variant count 
  kb_variant = intl,  #PR: added line per Grok suggestion; here making the default 'intl'
  kb_options = grp:alt_space_toggle
  ...
  }

~/.config/waybar/config.jsonc:

  "hyprland/language":  {
  "format": "{}",
  "format-en": "US", 
  "format-en-intl": "US-INTL",  //PR: not sure why "en" and not "us" to match the format in hyprland.conf
  "on-click": "hyprctl switchxkblayout <your-kb-device-name> next"
}

[jadesro]

Thanks for posting this exact solution for us.

To address the issue where waybar/config.jsonc gets overwritten during an Omarchy update, I ended up adding

killall waybar; waybar -c ~/.config/waybar/config.personal.jsonc &

to my .bashrc.

[bragmore]

Why is this working only when a terminal is open on the same window? it does not work if the terminal is closed however. Any solution to this?

[yuters]

I do not have this issue, did you notice this on a fresh install?
Maybe try using another shortcut like grp:ctrl_space_toggle in your input config.