World Language Map

Languages spoken in the United Arab Emirates

12 living languages are mapped in the United Arab Emirates. The most widely spoken, by Unicode CLDR’s estimate, is Standard Arabic (78% of the population). They belong to 3 language families, the largest being Afro-Asiatic (6 languages).

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The filter only changes what is drawn. Tap the map to list every language at a spot, whichever family is shown. You can also pick any family from its own page.

Key

Language families (largest ten)

  • Atlantic-Congo
  • Austronesian
  • Sino-Tibetan
  • Indo-European
  • Afro-Asiatic
  • Nuclear Trans New Guinea
  • Otomanguean
  • Austroasiatic
  • Tai-Kadai
  • Pama-Nyungan

Everything else

  • All other families Smaller families, isolates and unclassified languages.
  • Point A language with no area map. The dot sits at its Glottolog position, in its family colour.

How to read the map. Each colour is a language family: a group of languages that share a common ancestor. The ten largest families have their own colour and every other family is grey. Areas are see-through, so where two languages share a place the colours mix. Tap anywhere to list every language whose area covers that spot. Areas are generalisations drawn from published atlases, many of them decades old, and cities are multilingual, so an area never says that everyone there speaks the language. A dot marks a language that has no area map. The family name is always given in words, because colour alone is hard to tell apart for some people.

Languages of the United Arab Emirates at a glance

  • 12living languages
  • 3language families
  • 10 millionpeople (CLDR estimate)
  • 6with a CLDR share

Tap the map to list every language whose area covers a spot in the United Arab Emirates. Areas are generalisations from published atlases and overlap, and a language that is mapped here is not necessarily spoken everywhere inside its area.

Languages spoken in the United Arab Emirates

Languages with a Unicode CLDR share come first, biggest first by estimated speakers; the rest follow A to Z. Estimated speakers are the share applied to CLDR’s own population figure for the country.

LanguageFamilyShare of populationEstimated speakersStatus
Standard ArabicAfro-Asiatic78%7,825,116Not endangered
EnglishIndo-European50%5,016,100Not endangered
MalayalamDravidian7%702,254Not endangered
Southern PashtoIndo-European2.9%290,934Not endangered
Southern BalochiIndo-European2.3%230,741Not endangered
Western FarsiIndo-European1.9%190,612Not endangered
Gulf ArabicAfro-AsiaticNot endangered
KumzariIndo-EuropeanThreatened
Najdi ArabicAfro-AsiaticNot endangered
Omani ArabicAfro-AsiaticNot endangered
Ru'us al-JibalAfro-AsiaticNot endangered
SoqotriAfro-AsiaticShifting

Read more: where is Standard Arabic spoken?

Language families in the United Arab Emirates

About these numbers

The list of languages in the United Arab Emirates comes from the overlap of Glottography and Glottolog language areas and positions with the country outline, together with the languages Glottolog assigns to the country. The shares come from Unicode CLDR release 48 and are estimates. See every source and licence.

Questions about languages in the United Arab Emirates

How many languages are spoken in the United Arab Emirates?

12 living languages are mapped in the United Arab Emirates, from 3 families. The number depends on how a catalogue decides where one language ends and another begins, so other sources give other totals.

What is the most spoken language in the United Arab Emirates?

By Unicode CLDR's estimate, Standard Arabic is spoken by 78% of the population, about 7,825,116 people, followed by English (50%). Shares are approximate, can add up to more than 100% because many people speak several languages, and only cover languages CLDR has a figure for.

Which language families are found in the United Arab Emirates?

Afro-Asiatic (6 languages), Indo-European (5 languages) and Dravidian (1 language).

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