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Turkmen

Turkic Languages

Turkmen is a Turkic language of the Oghuz branch spoken by the Turkmens of Central Asia. It has an estimated 4.7 million native speakers in Turkmenistan, plus a further 359,000 speakers in northeastern Iran and 1.2 million people in northwestern Afghanistan, where it has no official status.

Facts
ISO 639-3 Code
tuk 2
Speaker Count
6,800,000 2
2023 estimate, first-language (L1) speakers; the infobox also gives a second-language total of 1 million (2021) and a combined total of 7.8 million (2021-2023), not captured here.
Status
Living 2
Wikipedia article on Turkmen: a currently spoken living language with an active native-speaker population; checked 2026-09-27.
Region
Turkmenistan, Russia, Iran, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan 2
Classification
Language Kind
Safe 1
Official Status
No Official Status 2
Connections

In Family

Source Wikipedia: Turkmen Language
Source Wikipedia: Turkmen Language

Written In

Latin Script, Scripts

Turkmen is standardly written in the Latin alphabet (official since the 1990s).

In the Other Atlases

Found In

Also in Geography Atlas: where this subject is found.

Source Wikipedia: Turkmen LanguageLead sentence 1tier 2
Quote, Lead sentence 1
Turkmen (türkmençe, түркменче, تۆرکمنچه, [tʏɾkˈmøntʃø] or türkmen dili, түркмен дили, تۆرکمن ديلی, [tʏɾkˈmøn dɪˈlɪ]) is a Turkic language of the Oghuz branch spoken by the Turkmens of Central Asia.

Also in Geography Atlas: where this subject is found.

Sources
1. Glottolog: Turkmen (Glottolog languoid turk1304)
GlottologEndangerment, AES status
Quote, Endangerment, AES status
AES status: not endangered
View the Source
2. Wikipedia: Turkmen Language
Wikimedia Foundation
  • Lead section
    It has an estimated 4.7 million native speakers in Turkmenistan (where it is the official language), plus a further 359,000 speakers in northeastern Iran and 1.2 million people in northwestern Afghanistan, where it has no official status. Turkmen is also spoken to lesser varying degrees in Turkmen communities of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan and by diaspora communities, primarily in Turkey and Russia.
  • Infobox: iso2
    tuk
  • Infobox: speakers2
    L2: million (2021) Total: million (2021-2023)
  • Infobox: states
    Turkmenistan, Russia, Iran, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan
  • Lead section
    It has an estimated 4.7 million native speakers in Turkmenistan (where it is the official language), plus a further 359,000 speakers in northeastern Iran and 1.2 million people in northwestern Afghanistan, where it has no official status.
  • In Family: Turkic, Infobox, Language family
    Turkic
  • In Family: Oghuz, Infobox, Language family
    Oghuz
View the Source
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