diff --git a/Common/Render/Text/draw_text_sdl.cpp b/Common/Render/Text/draw_text_sdl.cpp
index ab93190da6..02a08072d6 100644
--- a/Common/Render/Text/draw_text_sdl.cpp
+++ b/Common/Render/Text/draw_text_sdl.cpp
@@ -58,6 +58,15 @@ static bool ReorderBidi(std::string_view str, std::string *out) {
 			result.push_back('\n');
 		}
 		std::string_view line = lines[i];
+		FriBidiParType baseDir = FRIBIDI_PAR_ON;
+		// TextDrawer::ApplyBaseDirection wraps RTL lines in RLE ... PDF. Take the direction from that instead,
+		// so the marks don't count as a second level and send pure Arabic lines down the reordering path.
+		const std::string_view rle = "\xE2\x80\xAB";
+		const std::string_view pdf = "\xE2\x80\xAC";
+		if (line.size() >= rle.size() + pdf.size() && startsWith(line, rle) && endsWith(line, pdf)) {
+			line = line.substr(rle.size(), line.size() - rle.size() - pdf.size());
+			baseDir = FRIBIDI_PAR_RTL;
+		}
 		logical.resize(line.size() + 1);
 		FriBidiStrIndex len = fribidi_charset_to_unicode(FRIBIDI_CHAR_SET_UTF8, line.data(), (FriBidiStrIndex)line.size(), logical.data());
 		if (len <= 0) {
@@ -66,7 +75,6 @@ static bool ReorderBidi(std::string_view str, std::string *out) {
 		}
 		visual.resize(len + 1);
 		levels.resize(len);
-		FriBidiParType baseDir = FRIBIDI_PAR_ON;
 		if (!fribidi_log2vis(logical.data(), len, &baseDir, visual.data(), nullptr, nullptr, levels.data())) {
 			return false;
 		}
diff --git a/UI/MiscScreens.cpp b/UI/MiscScreens.cpp
index c5e981a65f..941bd0c755 100644
--- a/UI/MiscScreens.cpp
+++ b/UI/MiscScreens.cpp
@@ -304,9 +304,8 @@ NewLanguageScreen::NewLanguageScreen(std::string_view title) : ListPopupScreen(t
 			continue;
 		}
 
-		// We only support Arabic on platforms where we have support for the native text rendering
-		// APIs, as proper Arabic support is way too difficult to implement ourselves.
-#if !(PPSSPP_PLATFORM(WINDOWS) || PPSSPP_PLATFORM(ANDROID))
+		// Arabic script needs a text drawer that does shaping (see TextDrawer::Create), the atlas font can't.
+#if defined(__LIBRETRO__) || !(PPSSPP_PLATFORM(WINDOWS) || PPSSPP_PLATFORM(ANDROID) || PPSSPP_PLATFORM(MAC) || PPSSPP_PLATFORM(IOS) || defined(USE_SDL3_TTF))
 		if (tempLangs[i].name.find("ar_AE") != std::string::npos) {
 			continue;
 		}