Atlantic-Congo · ISO 639-3 kck
Kalanga Language TjiKalanga
Kalanga is an Atlantic-Congo language spoken by about 1.7 million people in 2 countries. It is written in the Latin script.
Where Kalanga is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
About the Kalanga language
Kalanga (TjiKalanga) is spoken by about 1.7 million people, which makes it the 338th most spoken language in the world — just behind Rohingya (1.8 million) and ahead of Alur (1.7 million). It belongs to the Atlantic-Congo language family and, more precisely, to the Kalanga-Nambya group within the Benue-Congo branch.
Where is Kalanga spoken?
Kalanga is used in 2 countries. The largest communities live in Botswana (950,000) and Zimbabwe (908,971).
Share of the population that speaks Kalanga: Botswana 39% (950,000) and Zimbabwe 5.3% (908,971).
Kalanga is not a national official language anywhere.
Writing system and status
Kalanga is written in the Latin script. It is a safe, widely transmitted language: children still learn it at home as their first language.
Its closest relatives in the same branch of the family are Shona, Zulu, Tsonga, Xhosa, Southern Sotho, Tswana and 2 more.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 kck.
Frequently asked questions about Kalanga
How many people speak Kalanga?
Where is Kalanga spoken?
What language family does Kalanga belong to?
What is Kalanga called in Kalanga?
Is Kalanga an endangered language?
Data: Languages of the World dataset (MIT) — ISO 639-3, Glottolog (CC BY 4.0), Unicode CLDR, Google LinguaMeta (CC BY 4.0) and Wikidata; country lists: samayo/country-json (MIT). Speaker numbers include first- and second-language speakers where sources report them.