Atlantic-Congo · ISO 639-3 tum
Tumbuka Language Chitumbuka
Tumbuka is an Atlantic-Congo language spoken by about 7.0 million people in 2 countries. It is written in the Latin script.
Where Tumbuka is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
Language family
- Atlantic-Congo
- Volta-Congo
- Benue-Congo
- Bantoid
- Southern Bantoid
- Narrow Bantu
- East Bantu
- Tumbuka-Sena-Nyanja
- Tumbukic
- Tumbuka
Writing system
Latin script
Related languages
About the Tumbuka language
Tumbuka (Chitumbuka) is spoken by about 7.0 million people, which makes it the 154th most spoken language in the world — just behind Sadri (7.0 million) and ahead of Varhadi-Nagpuri (7.0 million). It belongs to the Atlantic-Congo language family and, more precisely, to the Tumbukic group within the Benue-Congo branch.
Where is Tumbuka spoken?
Tumbuka is used in 2 countries. The largest communities live in Malawi (1.8 million) and Zambia (540,776).
Share of the population that speaks Tumbuka: Malawi 8.4% (1.8 million) and Zambia 2.6% (540,776).
Tumbuka is not a national official language anywhere.
Writing system and status
Tumbuka 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 Chichewa, Malawi Sena, Sena, Swahili, Zulu, Tsonga and 2 more.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 tum.
Frequently asked questions about Tumbuka
How many people speak Tumbuka?
Where is Tumbuka spoken?
What language family does Tumbuka belong to?
What is Tumbuka called in Tumbuka?
Is Tumbuka 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.