Who Speaks Swahili?
Swahili is the most widely spoken language in sub-Saharan Africa and is the common tongue for most East Africans (although it's not necessarily their first language). Swahili is an official language alongside English in Kenya and Tanzania, and primary school children are usually taught in Swahili. It has been an official language in Ugandan since 2022. The official language of the Comoro Islands, Comorian, is a Bantu language related to Swahili. If you're traveling in Rwanda or Burundi, French will probably get you further than Swahili (after English, of course) but a few words here and there will be understood and the effort appreciated. Swahili is also spoken in parts of Malawi , Zambia, the DRC , Somalia, and Mozambique. The 2019 edition of the reference publication Ethnologue estimates that dialects of Swahili are spoken as a first language by roughly 16 million people and by over 200 million people worldwide. This makes Swahili the 10th-most widely spoken language in...