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Somali
Somali

Chinese
Chinese



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Somali
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Somali vs Chinese

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Countries

Countries

Djibouti, Kenya, Somalia
China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, Taiwan

Total No. Of Countries

35
0 46
👆🏻

National Language

Somalia
China, Taiwan

Second Language

Not spoken in any of the countries
Republic of Brazil

Speaking Continents

Africa, Middle East
Asia

Minority Language

Yemen
Indonesia, Malaysia

Regulated By

National Languages Committee, Regional Somali Language Academy
Chinese Language Standardization Council, National Commission on Language and Script Work, Promote Mandarin Council

Interesting Facts

  • Somali language is one of the best documented Afro-Asiatic languages.
  • One of the most widely spoken of the Cushitic languages is the Somali Language.
  • Chinese language is tonal, since meaning of a word changes according to its tone.
  • In Chinese language, there is no grammatical distinction between singular or plural, no declination of verbs according to tense, mood and aspect.

Similar To

Afar and Oromo Language
Japanese and Korean Languages

Derived From

Arabic Language
-

Alphabets

Alphabets in

Alphabets

2626
18 247
👆🏻

Phonology

How Many Vowels

524
0 32
👆🏻

How Many Consonants

2123
9 60
👆🏻

Scripts

Arabic, Latin, Osmanya
Chinese Characters and derivatives

Writing Direction

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

Hard to Learn

Language Levels

56
2 12
👆🏻

Time Taken to Learn

52 weeks88 weeks
3 88
👆🏻

Greetings

Hello

Hello
您好 (Nín hǎo)

Thank You

Waad ku mahadsan tahay
谢谢 (Xièxiè)

How Are You?

Sidee tahay ?
你好吗? (Nǐ hǎo ma?)

Good Night

Habeenka Good
晚安 (Wǎn'ān)

Good Evening

Evening Good
晚上好 (Wǎnshàng hǎo)

Good Afternoon

galab wanaagsan
下午好 (Xiàwǔ hǎo)

Good Morning

Subax wanaagsan
早安 (Zǎo ān)

Please

Fadlan
请 (Qǐng)

Sorry

sorry
遗憾 (Yíhàn)

Bye

caraysiiyo
再见 (Zàijiàn)

I Love You

Waan ku jeclahay
我爱你 (Wǒ ài nǐ)

Excuse Me

iga raali ahow
劳驾 (Láojià)

Dialects

Dialect 1

Northern Somali
Mandarin

Where They Speak

Gabon, Standard Somali
China, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan

How Many People Speak

16,000,000.00960,000,000.00
1.5 960000000
👆🏻

Dialect 2

Benaadir
Wu

Where They Speak

Georgia, The capital of Mogadishu
China, United States of America

How Many People Speak

16,000,000.0080,000,000.00
700 274000000
👆🏻

Dialect 3

Af-Ashraaf
Yue

Where They Speak

Standard Somali
China, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam

How Many People Speak

21.0060,000,000.00
2 230000000
👆🏻

Total No. Of Dialects

310
0 188
👆🏻

How Many People Speak

How Many People Speak?

13.00 million1,051.00 million
0 1200
👆🏻

Speaking Population

0.07 %16.00 %
0 89
👆🏻

Native Speakers

8.00 million873.00 million
0 873
👆🏻

Second Language Speakers

21.00 million178.00 million
0.01 400
👆🏻

Native Name

af Soomaali
中文 (zhōngwén)

Alternative Names

Af-Maxaad Tiri, Af-Soomaali, Common Somali, Soomaaliga
Zhongwen, Hanyu

French Name

somali
chinois

German Name

Somali
Chinesisch

Pronunciation

[afsoomaali]
[ʈʂʰíŋ] [huà]

Ethnicity

Somalis
Han

History

Origin

19th century
1250 BC

Language Family

Afro-Asiatic Family
Sino-Tibetan Family

Subgroup

Cushitic
-

Branch

-
-

Language Forms

Early Forms

No early forms
No early forms

Standard Forms

Somali
Standard Chinese

Language Position

831
1 120
👆🏻

Signed Forms

Somali Sign Language
Wenfa Shouyu 文法手語 ("Grammatical Sign Language", Signed Mandarin (Taiwan))

Scope

Individual
Individual

Code

ISO 639 1

so
zh

ISO 639 2

ISO 639 2/T

som
zho

ISO 639 2/B

som
chi

ISO 639 3

som
zho

ISO 639 6

som
zho

Glottocode

soma1255
sini1245

Linguasphere

No data available
79-AAA

Types of Language

Language Type

Living
Living

Language Linguistic Typology

Subject-Object-Verb
Subject-Verb-Object

Language Morphological Typology

-
Analytic, Isolating

Somali vs Chinese Speaking Countries

There are plenty of languages spoken around the world. Every country has its own official language. Compare Somali vs Chinese speaking countries, so that you will have total count of countries that speak Somali or Chinese language.

  • Somali is spoken as a national language in: Somalia.
  • Chinese is spoken as a national language in: China, Taiwan.

You will also get to know the continents where Somali and Chinese speaking countries lie. Based on the number of people that speak these languages, the position of Somali language is 83 and position of Chinese language is 1. Find all the information about these languages on Somali and Chinese.

Somali and Chinese Language History

Comparison of Somali vs Chinese language history gives us differences between origin of Somali and Chinese language. History of Somali language states that this language originated in 19th century whereas history of Chinese language states that this language originated in 1250 BC. Family of the language also forms a part of history of that language. More on language families of these languages can be found out on Somali and Chinese Language History.

Somali and Chinese Greetings

People around the world use different languages to interact with each other. Even if we cannot communicate fluently in any language, it will always be beneficial to know about some of the common greetings or phrases from that language. This is where Somali and Chinese greetings helps you to understand basic phrases in Somali and Chinese language. Somali word for "Hello" is Hello or Chinese word for "Thank You" is 谢谢 (Xièxiè). Find more of such common Somali Greetings and Chinese Greetings. These greetings will help you to be more confident when conversing with natives that speak these languages.

Somali vs Chinese Difficulty

The Somali vs Chinese difficulty level basically depends on the number of Somali Alphabets and Chinese Alphabets. Also the number of vowels and consonants in the language plays an important role in deciding the difficulty level of that language. The important points to be considered when we compare Somali and Chinese are the origin, speaking countries, language family, different greetings, speaking population of these languages. Want to know in Somali and Chinese, which language is harder to learn? Time required to learn Somali is 52 weeks while to learn Chinese time required is 88 weeks.