Home›African Language Families›Region›Southern AfricaBrowse BySouthern AfricaRegion names where a language family is spoken today, which can be far wider than where it began. Wikipedia notes several Indo-European languages "have expanded through colonialism in the modern period and are now spoken across Africa, Americas, Oceania and North Asia." This dimension shows the present-day reach of a family rather than only its point of origin.FactsSouthern AfricaSourcesComments (0)Reader Challenges (0)FactsComparisonEstimated Living LanguagesWell-attested2100 1Southern AfricaFilter Results6 entriesMacro-areaAllBantu Languages (4)Khoisan (2)Parent Family (Classification Tree)AllNiger-Congo (1)Speaker Count BandAll24,600 to 795,000 (1)798,400 to 3,238,000,000 (1)Reconstructed AncestorAllReconstructed (1)Classification StatusAllEstablished (3)Number of LanguagesAll3 to 5 (2)6 to 15 (1)In GroupAllBantu Languages (4)Khoisan (2)Show ResultsBrowseCompareSelect all 6BantuSouthern AfricaKhoisanSouthern AfricaKx'aSouthern AfricaNguniSouthern AfricaSotho-Tswana languagesSouthern AfricaTswa-Ronga languagesSouthern AfricaSources1. Wikipedia: Languages Of AfricaWikimedia FoundationLead sectionQuote, Lead sectionThe number of languages natively spoken in Africa is variously estimated (depending on the delineation of language vs. dialect) at between 1,250 and 2,100, and by some counts at over 3,000.View the SourceComments (0)No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.Sign in to join the discussion.Reader Challenges (0)No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.