China is the largest country in Asia. It has a total area of 9,596,961 square kilometers or 3,705,407 square miles. The country features a variety of languages spoken in China. Mandarin Chinese is The official National language of China. It is based on the dialect of the Han ethnic group from the North. The predominant language is sometimes called Hanyu. Mandarin is the world’s most spoken language with 1.5 billion speakers.
As of the latest data from Ethnologue, China has 302 individual living languages, 276 of which are indigenous. The United Nations celebrates April 20 as Chinese Language Day, which is part of the organization’s effort to promote its six official languages as well as celebrate linguistic and cultural diversity.
Mandarin Chinese is the official language of China and it’s based on the dialect of the Han ethnic group from the North. There are seven primary language groups or varieties in the Han language that are so different they aren’t mutually intelligible much like German and English. The languages most frequently supported and studied include Chinese Mongolian Tibetan Uyghur Zhuang.
Languages Spoken in Areas
| Official | North China | Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei Province, Henan Province, Shandong Province, Liaoning Province, Jilin Province, Heilongjiang Province, Part of Inner Mongolia |
| Northwest China | Shanxi Province, Shaanxi Province, Gansu Province, Part of Qinghai Province, Ningxia Province, and Inner Mongolia | |
| Southwest China | Most areas of Hubei Province (southeastern and eastern parts excluded ), Yunnan Province, Guizhou Province, Sichuan Province, north sides of Hunan Province, and Guangxi Province | |
| Yangtze-HuaiRiver | Areas along the northern and southern banks of Yangtze River in Anhui Province, Northern areas of Yangtze River in Jiangsu Province (Huizhou excluded), Southern areas of Yangtze River (northernmost to Nanjing and southernmost to Zhenjiang) | |
| Non-official | Wu | The southern part of Jiangsu Province; Zhejiang Province |
| Gan | Jiangxi province | |
| Xiang | Hunan province; the northern part of Guangxi Province | |
| Yue | Guangdong province; Southeast part of Guangxi Province | |
| Min | Fujian province; Taiwan Province; Guangdong Province (Chaozhou, Shantou), Hainan Province | |
| Hakka | Eastern and northern part of Guangdong Province; Western part of Fujian Province; Southern part of Jiangxi Province; Taiwan Province |
Other Languages of China
- Wu
On the coastal area in Shanghai, Wu is the Chinese dialect spoken. In 2017, there were 81.4 million speakers of the Wu language in China. All over the world, the total number of Wu speakers is 81.5 million. - Yue
Yue is a dialect that is not mutually intelligible with the other Chinese dialects. It comes second after Mandarin in terms of use. There are about 62 million speakers of Yue in China. - Xiang
In Southern China’s Hunan province, the dominant dialect is Xiang.