Britannica Sources used in this answer

Why do Hindi and Urdu use different writing systems?

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Indo-Aryan languages Devanagari script from a section of the Sanskrit Bhagavata Purana, c. 1880–c. 1900; in the British Library.

Hindi and Urdu are closely related languages that share the same Indo-Aryan base and are mutually intelligible, yet they utilize different writing systems due to their distinct cultural and historical influences.12

The primary difference lies in their respective lexical sources and the scripts adopted to represent them:

Urdu uses a modified form of the Perso-Arabic script known as Nastaliq. This reflects the language's historical development as a modus vivendi following the Muslim conquest in the 12th century, leading to extensive borrowing from Arabic and Persian.12
Hindi uses the Devanagari script. This script is rooted in the Sanskrit tradition, which serves as the primary source for Hindi's vocabulary and cultural identity.12

While their phonology and grammar remain largely identical, these divergent writing systems serve as the most marked distinction between the two languages, reflecting their unique linguistic heritages.12