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Haitian Creole

Language Isolates, Creoles and Pidgins

Haitian Creole, or simply Creole, is a French-based creole language with a Romance foundation and significant Atlantic-Congo structural influences, spoken by over 13 million people worldwide. It is one of the two official languages of Haiti, where it is the native language of the vast majority of the population, and is the most widely spoken creole language in the world.

Facts
ISO 639-3 Code
hat 2
Speaker Count
13,000,000 2
2020 estimate.
Status
Living 2
Wikipedia article on Haitian Creole: a currently spoken living language with an active native-speaker population; checked 2026-09-27.
Attested From (Year)
from 1757 2
Region
Haiti 2
Classification
Language Kind
Safe 1
Official Status
Official Language 2
Connections

Descends From

French, Languages

Haitian Creole is a French-lexifier creole language, textbook-classified as descending from (colonial) French.

In Family

French-based Creole, Language Families
Source Wikipedia: Haitian Creole

Written In

Latin Script, Scripts

Haitian Creole is standardly written in the Latin alphabet.

In the Other Atlases

Cases Where Used

Saint-Domingue

Also in Divinity Atlas: used in this subject.

The Caribbean

Also in Divinity Atlas: used in this subject.

West Africa and the Caribbean

Also in Divinity Atlas: used in this subject.

Found In

North America

Also in Geography Atlas: where this subject is found.

Sources
1. Glottolog: Haitian (Glottolog languoid hait1244)
GlottologEndangerment, AES status
Quote, Endangerment, AES status
AES status: not endangered
View the Source
2. Wikipedia: Haitian Creole
Wikimedia Foundation
  • Lead section
    Haitian Creole (Haitian Creole: kreyòl ayisyen, [kɣejɔl ajisjɛ̃]), or simply Creole (kreyòl), is an Afro-francophone-based creole language with a Romance foundation and significant Atlantic-Congo structural influences.
  • Infobox, ISO 639-3
    hat
  • Infobox: date
    2020
  • Infobox, Native to
    Haiti
  • French-based orthography
    The first written text of Haitian Creole was composed in the French-lexicon in a poem called Lisette quitté la plaine in 1757 by Duvivier de la Mahautière, a white Creole planter.
  • Lead section
    It is one of the two official languages of Haiti (the other being French), where it is the native language of the vast majority of the population. It is also the most widely spoken creole language in the world.
  • In Family: French-based Creole, Infobox: fam1
    French Creole
View the Source
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