Bulgarian

About Bulgarian

Bulgarian is the official language of Bulgaria and one of the official languages of the European Union, with about 9 million speakers in Bulgaria and abroad. It is a South Slavic language, very close to Macedonian, and the Cyrillic alphabet took shape in the medieval Bulgarian state.

Bulgarian is written in Cyrillic. Use vie as the polite "you" and ti with friends. A polite hello is zdraveyte, and to a friend zdravey. Stress can fall on any syllable and has to be learned with each word. One gesture surprises visitors: many Bulgarians nod to mean no and shake the head to mean yes.

FamilyIndo-European, South Slavic
Speakersabout 9 million (2014)
Official inBulgaria
ScriptCyrillic alphabet, 30 letters
Codesbg (ISO 639-1), bul (ISO 639-3)

Speaker number: The Columbia Encyclopedia (2014), via Wikidata. Retrieved 26 September 2026.

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