Literary Tibetan has no punctuation in the European sense of the term: there are no syntactic signs to mark off groups of words, clauses, enumerations, etc. However, there are a number of signs to indicate breathers and pauses in the text, although their use is neither systematic nor obligatory.

Of all the symbols used in Tibetan, the closest to the European notion of punctuation is the simple bar ། called རྐྱང་ཤད་ or ཚེག་རིང་. It goes directly after the last letter of a word, in the place of the intersyllabic dot. There are two exceptions to this rule. First, the simple bar is not used after the letter ག་, when the latter carries no subscript or superscript; in this case one simply writes ག. Secondly, after the letter ང་, an intersyllabic dot is placed before the རྐྱང་ཤད་, resulting in ང་།. This is to avoid confusion with a བ followed by a རྐྱང་ཤད་: བ།.

This punctuation bar may be used to mark the end of a clause, to make it easier to break up a sentence, and to emphasize the rhythm of the statements by marking pauses. It may also occur after individual words, especially in the case of lists. It may also go after case markers (Ø, གིས་, ནས་, ལ་, དུ་, ལས་, etc.), conjunctions (ཞིང་, དང་, ནས་, སྟེ་, ལ་, etc.), and verbs, as well as after the final particle འོ་. The རྐྱང་ཤད་ may be represented in European languages by a comma, a semicolon, a colon, a question mark, or a period. Note that the simple bar is used at the end of each line in poetic verse.

In Literary Tibetan, many of the tasks that European languages assign to punctuation are fulfilled by grammatical particles. Thus འོ་ (and its variants) signify a period or the end of reported speech, བཅས་ concludes a list and ཅེས་ closes reported speech. One meaning of the particle སྟེ་ is comparable to the function of the semicolon. And finally, depending on the context, the particle འམ་ may correspond to a question mark, a colon or a comma.

Apart from the རྐྱང་ཤད་, Tibetan literature also uses the following symbols:

• The sign ༄༅, which is called ཡིག་མགོ་ or དབུ་འཁྱུད་, marks the beginning of a text or of a page. However, other indicators of new chapters may appear on the top left-hand corner of a page. The svasti precedes texts concerned with ethics, the stem and the lotus denote official correspondence, while the jewel introduces chapters that deal with religion.
• The double bar ༎, called ཉིས་ཤད་, usually marks the end of a section, and may be rendered by a full stop. In verse texts, the double bar is always written at the end of each verse.
• Two double bars ༎ ༎, called བཞི་ཤད་, mark the end of a chapter or an entire work.
• The “serpentine” ༈, or སྦྲུལ་ཤད་, marks a separation between two chapters.
• The རིན་ཆེན་སྤུང་ཤད་, a bar surmounted by one, two, or three small dots (༑), appears on the left of a folio when the line begins with a single syllable, to signify the end of the preceding sentence.
• The གཏེར་ཤད་ takes the form of two circles placed one on top of the other and separated by a horizontal line (༔). This sign is used instead of the simple bar in གཏེར་མ་ or “treasure-texts” which are traditionally held to have been concealed by Padmasambhava and subsequently brought to light by “treasure-revealers” གཏེར་སྟོན་.
• A sequence of intersyllabic dots signifies that the scribe has made a mistake (the dots fill the space occupied by the erased letters), or that there was no room to write the syllables before the end of a line.

A few other punctuation marks may be added to this list:

• The sign ྾, which is called a ཀུ་རུ་ཁ་ or “cross,” stands for omitted material that is frequently repeated within the text (in the case of prayers, for example).
• A little circle written beneath a syllable is intended to attract the reader’s attention to the word in question. It corresponds to underlining in European languages.        
• Sentences written in letters smaller than those of the main text, correspond to notes on the original work that have been added by the author or a later commentator.
• Inverted commas and, more rarely, question marks, are sometimes used in modern writings.