Turkic · ISO 639-3 kaz · kk
Kazakh Language қазақ
Kazakh is a Turkic language spoken by about 13 million people in 7 countries. It is an official language of Kazakhstan. It is written in the Cyrillic, Perso-Arabic and Latin scripts.
Where Kazakh is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
Countries that speak Kazakh
Language family
- Turkic
- Common Turkic
- Kipchak-Turkestan
- Kipchak
- Southeast Kipchak
- South Kipchak
- Kazakh
Writing system
Cyrillic, Perso-Arabic and Latin scripts
Related languages
About the Kazakh language
Kazakh (қазақ) is spoken by about 13 million people, which makes it the 94th most spoken language in the world — just behind Sylheti (14 million) and ahead of Sanaani Arabic (13 million). It belongs to the Turkic language family and, more precisely, to the South Kipchak group within the Kipchak-Turkestan branch.
Where is Kazakh spoken?
Kazakh is used in 7 countries. The largest communities live in Kazakhstan (13 million), China (1.2 million), Russia (281,642), Mongolia (236,280) and Iran (3,005). More than half of the population speaks it in Kazakhstan — the places where travellers will hear it everywhere.
Share of the population that speaks Kazakh: Kazakhstan 64% (13 million), China <0.1% (1.2 million), Russia 0.2% (281,642), Mongolia 7.2% (236,280), Iran <0.1% (3,005) and Afghanistan <0.1% (2,006).
Kazakh is an official language in 1 country: Kazakhstan.
Writing system and status
Kazakh is written in the Cyrillic, Perso-Arabic and Latin scripts. 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 Kirghiz, Tatar, Bashkir, Kumyk, Karachay-Balkar, Northern Uzbek and 2 more.
ISO codes: ISO 639-1 kk, ISO 639-3 kaz.
Frequently asked questions about Kazakh
How many people speak Kazakh?
Where is Kazakh spoken?
In which countries is Kazakh an official language?
What language family does Kazakh belong to?
What is Kazakh called in Kazakh?
Is Kazakh 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.