Kazakh

About Kazakh

Kazakh is the state language of Kazakhstan, where Russian is also widely used, and it is spoken as a first language by about 13 million people. Kazakh communities also live in China, Mongolia, Uzbekistan and Russia. It is a Turkic language, related to Kyrgyz, Uzbek and Turkish.

Kazakh is written in Cyrillic in Kazakhstan, with extra letters for its own sounds, and the country is gradually moving to a Latin alphabet. Kazakhs in China use Arabic script. Use siz for a polite "you" with elders and strangers and sen with friends.

FamilyTurkic, Kipchak
Native speakersabout 13 million (2019)
Official inKazakhstan
ScriptCyrillic, Latin, Arabic script in China
Codeskk (ISO 639-1), kaz (ISO 639-3)

Speaker number: Ethnologue (2019), via Wikidata. Retrieved 26 September 2026.

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