Tahitian

About Tahitian

Tahitian is the Polynesian language of Tahiti and the other Society Islands in French Polynesia, spoken by about 68,000 people in a 2007 count. French is the only official language of French Polynesia, but Tahitian is widely used and taught in schools. It is related to Hawaiian, Maori and Samoan.

Tahitian has a small alphabet and every vowel is pronounced. A macron marks a long vowel, and an apostrophe-like mark called the ʻeta is a short catch in the throat. The everyday greeting is ia ora na (hello) and thank you is māuruuru.

FamilyAustronesian, Polynesian
Speakersabout 68,000 (2007)
Where spokenFrench Polynesia
ScriptLatin alphabet
Codesty (ISO 639-1), tah (ISO 639-3)

Speaker number: Ethnologue (2007), via Wikidata. Retrieved 26 September 2026.

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