Indo-European · ISO 639-3 tpi
Tok Pisin Language
Tok Pisin is an Indo-European language spoken by about 5.2 million people in 1 country. It is an official language of Papua New Guinea. It is written in the Latin script.
Where Tok Pisin is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
Countries that speak Tok Pisin
Language family
- Indo-European
- Classical Indo-European
- Germanic
- Northwest Germanic
- West Germanic
- North Sea Germanic
- Anglo-Frisian
- Anglic
- Later Anglic
- Middle-Modern English
- Macro-English
- Pacific Creole English
- Early Melanesian Pidgin
- Tok Pisin
Writing system
Latin script
Related languages
About the Tok Pisin language
Tok Pisin is spoken by about 5.2 million people, which makes it the 183rd most spoken language in the world — just behind Tatar (5.2 million) and ahead of Hadrami Arabic (5.1 million). It belongs to the Indo-European language family and, more precisely, to the Early Melanesian Pidgin group within the Germanic branch.
Where is Tok Pisin spoken?
Tok Pisin is used in 1 country. The largest communities live in Papua New Guinea (7.1 million). More than half of the population speaks it in Papua New Guinea — the places where travellers will hear it everywhere.
Tok Pisin is an official language in 1 country: Papua New Guinea.
Writing system and status
Tok Pisin 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 Bislama, English, Nigerian Pidgin, Krio, Ghanaian Pidgin English, Jamaican Creole English and 2 more.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 tpi.
Frequently asked questions about Tok Pisin
How many people speak Tok Pisin?
Where is Tok Pisin spoken?
In which countries is Tok Pisin an official language?
What language family does Tok Pisin belong to?
Is Tok Pisin 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.