Uralic · ISO 639-3 ekk
Standard Estonian Language eesti
Standard Estonian is an Uralic language spoken by about 1.2 million people in 1 country. It is written in the Latin script.
Where Standard Estonian is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
About the Standard Estonian language
Standard Estonian (eesti) is spoken by about 1.2 million people, which makes it the 437th most spoken language in the world — just behind Eastern Tamang (1.2 million) and ahead of Muong (1.1 million). It belongs to the Uralic language family and, more precisely, to the Central Finnic group within the Coastal Finnic branch.
Where is Standard Estonian spoken?
Standard Estonian is used in 1 country. The largest communities live in Estonia (1.1 million). More than half of the population speaks it in Estonia — the places where travellers will hear it everywhere.
Standard Estonian is not a national official language anywhere.
Writing system and status
Standard Estonian 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 Finnish and Estonian.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 ekk.
Frequently asked questions about Standard Estonian
How many people speak Standard Estonian?
Where is Standard Estonian spoken?
What language family does Standard Estonian belong to?
What is Standard Estonian called in Standard Estonian?
Is Standard Estonian 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.