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Cantonese
Cantonese




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Cantonese Language

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Countries

Countries

Hong Kong, Macau

Total No. Of Countries

2
Rank: 13 (Overall)
0 46
👆🏻

National Language

China, Guangdong

Second Language

Not spoken in any of the countries

Speaking Continents

Asia

Minority Language

Hawaii

Regulated By

Civil Service Bureau, Government of Hong Kong, Official Language Division

Interesting Facts

  • Cantonese have lot of slangs, many of them include words that do not make sense at all and some also have English in them.
  • Even though Cantonese and Mandarin are dialects of Chinese, Cantonese has 8 tones instead of Mandarin's 4.

Similar To

Chinese Language

Derived From

-

Alphabets

Alphabets in

Alphabets

28
Rank: 10 (Overall)
18 247
👆🏻

Phonology

How Many Vowels

8
Rank: 5 (Overall)
0 32
👆🏻

How Many Consonants

20
Rank: 10 (Overall)
9 60
👆🏻

Scripts

Chinese Characters and derivatives

Writing Direction

Left-To-Right, Horizontal, Top-To-Bottom

Hard to Learn

Language Levels

10
Rank: 8 (Overall)
2 12
👆🏻

Time Taken to Learn

88 weeks
Rank: 19 (Overall)
3 88
👆🏻

Greetings

Hello

您好

Thank You

谢谢

How Are You?

你好吗?

Good Night

晚安

Good Evening

晚上好

Good Afternoon

下午好

Good Morning

早上好

Please

Sorry

遗憾

Bye

再见

I Love You

我爱你

Excuse Me

原谅我

Dialects

Dialect 1

Guangzhou

Where They Speak

outside mainland China

How Many People Speak

71,000,000.00
Rank: 13 (Overall)
1.5 960000000
👆🏻

Dialect 2

Xiguan

Where They Speak

Hong Kong

How Many People Speak

71,000,000.00
Rank: 11 (Overall)
700 274000000
👆🏻

Dialect 3

Hong Kong

Where They Speak

Hong Kong

How Many People Speak

70,000,000.00
Rank: 10 (Overall)
2 230000000
👆🏻

Total No. Of Dialects

3
Rank: 3 (Overall)
0 188
👆🏻

How Many People Speak

How Many People Speak?

60.00 million
Rank: 27 (Overall)
0 1200
👆🏻

Speaking Population

16.00 %
Rank: 2 (Overall)
0 89
👆🏻

Native Speakers

52.00 million
Rank: 21 (Overall)
0 873
👆🏻

Second Language Speakers

71.00 million
Rank: 15 (Overall)
0.01 400
👆🏻

Native Name

Kwang Tung Wa

Alternative Names

Guangfu, Metropolitan Cantonese

French Name

cantonais

German Name

Kantonesisch

Pronunciation

[kʰɐn˧˥tʰœːn˧˥sɨ˧˥]

Ethnicity

Han Chinese

History

Origin

17th century

Language Family

Sino-Tibetan Family

Subgroup

-

Branch

-

Language Forms

Early Forms

No early forms

Standard Forms

Standard Cantonese

Language Position

1
Rank: 1 (Overall)
1 120
👆🏻

Signed Forms

Signed Cantonese

Scope

-

Code

ISO 639 1

No data available

ISO 639 2

ISO 639 2/T

yue

ISO 639 2/B

yue

ISO 639 3

No data available

ISO 639 6

yue

Glottocode

cant1236

Linguasphere

No data available

Types of Language

Language Type

-

Language Linguistic Typology

-

Language Morphological Typology

-

Origin of Cantonese language

In order to communicate with each other, the origin of language was the essential part. Various languages are spoken all over the world. Cantonese language is one of the Most Difficult Languages. The origin of Cantonese language states that it was put to use in 17th century. The history of Cantonese language reveals that the language is old and used since many years. Check out in brief about Cantonese Language History. Cantonese has no early forms. Standard Cantonese is the standard form of Cantonese language and it is used in government centers. Know all About Cantonese Language.

Cantonese population

Cantonese population gives us the total count of number of people speaking Cantonese language. Cantonese language is spoken by 60.00 million people in the world. Most of the Cantonese population lies in the Cantonese Speaking Countries. Cantonese language is spoken as first language by 52.00 million people and as second language by about 71.00 million people. Get to know Cantonese speaking population in detail.

Cantonese writing system

There are numerous writing systems but most widely used scripts are Latin, Cyrillic and Arabic. Cantonese writing system decides the alphabets, vowels and consonants i.e. the written form of Cantonese language. Some languages share common writing systems. Chinese Characters and derivatives script is used by Cantonese language. Learn more about . 

Information about Cantonese language

Check out all the information about Cantonese language here. You may find it interesting to learn Cantonese Alphabets or the vowels and consonants of this language. Also knowing about Cantonese Speaking Countries, Cantonese speaking continents and Cantonese Dialects will help in improving your knowledge about this language. Also while travelling to Cantonese countries knowing common Cantonese Greetings will help you in communicating with Cantonese people.