Turkic · ISO 639-3 azb
South Azerbaijani Language تۆرکجه
South Azerbaijani is a Turkic language spoken by about 24 million people in 1 country. It is written in the Perso-Arabic script.
Where South Azerbaijani is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
Countries that speak South Azerbaijani
Language family
- Turkic
- Common Turkic
- Oghuz
- Nuclear Oghuz
- Central Oghuz
- South Azerbaijani
Writing system
Perso-Arabic script
Related languages
About the South Azerbaijani language
South Azerbaijani (تۆرکجه) is spoken by about 24 million people, which makes it the 65th most spoken language in the world — just behind Dutch (24 million) and ahead of North Azerbaijani (24 million). It belongs to the Turkic language family and, more precisely, to the Central Oghuz group within the Oghuz branch.
Where is South Azerbaijani spoken?
South Azerbaijani is used in 1 country. The largest communities live in Iran (24 million).
South Azerbaijani is not a national official language anywhere.
Writing system and status
South Azerbaijani is written in the Perso-Arabic 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 North Azerbaijani, Turkish, Turkmen, Qashqa'i and Azerbaijani.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 azb.
Frequently asked questions about South Azerbaijani
How many people speak South Azerbaijani?
Where is South Azerbaijani spoken?
What language family does South Azerbaijani belong to?
What is South Azerbaijani called in South Azerbaijani?
Is South Azerbaijani 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.