The World of Languages · Indo-European
Welsh · Cymraeg
One of Europe's oldest living literary languages: a Celtic tongue of mutations, the 'll' sound and a famously long railway-station name.
- 538,300 speakers in total
- Latin script
- Official in 0 countries
Where Welsh is spoken
Tap or hover over a country. Colours show the language's status, based on Unicode CLDR territory data (population estimates mix sources and years).
Top countries by speakers
- United Kingdom · Y Deyrnas UnedigOfficial regionally · 890k (1.3%)
Key numbers
- Total speakers
- 538,300
- Source
- 2021 census of England and Wales (people aged 3+ in Wales who can speak Welsh), via Wikipedia
Welsh speakers in the census, 1891–2021
Census of England and Wales (people aged 3+ in Wales able to speak Welsh; no census was taken in 1941), via Wikidata and Wikipedia.
Welsh at a glance
Welsh (Cymraeg [kəmˈraːiɡ] or y Gymraeg [ə ɡəmˈraːiɡ]) is a Celtic language of the Brittonic subgroup that is native to the Welsh people. Welsh is spoken natively in Wales by about 18% of the population, by some in England, and in Y Wladfa (the Welsh colony in Chubut Province, Argentina). Historically, it has also been known in English as Cambrian, Cambric and Cymric.
The Welsh Language (Wales) Measure 2011 gave the Welsh language official status in Wales. Welsh and English are de jure official languages of the Senedd (the Welsh parliament). According to the 2021 census, 538,300 usual residents in Wales aged three or over (17.8% of the population) were able to speak Welsh, while just over a quarter (25.1%) reported having some Welsh language skills.
From the Wikipedia article Welsh language (CC BY-SA 4.0).
- Name in Welsh
- Cymraeg
- Family
- Indo-EuropeanClassical Indo-EuropeanCelticNuclear CelticCore CelticInsular CelticBrythonicOld-Modern Welsh
- Writing system
- Latin alphabet (28 letters with digraphs ch, dd, ff, ng, ll, ph, rh, th)
- Direction
- Left to right
- Official in
- —
- Codes
- ISO 639-3
cym· Glottologwels1247· Q9309 - Writing sample
Genir pawb yn rhydd ac yn gydradd â’i gilydd mewn urddas a hawliau. Fe’u cynysgaeddir â rheswm a chydwybod, a dylai pawb ymddwyn y naill at y llall mewn ysbryd cymodlon.
Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights…”
Linguistic profile
Welsh is not on the FSI's published list of difficulty categories.
Feature values from the World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS Online, CC BY 4.0).
The Welsh script
Latin alphabet (28 letters with digraphs ch, dd, ff, ng, ll, ph, rh, th). Tap a character to hear it (your device reads the letter name or sound).
Standard letters from Unicode CLDR exemplar characters.
Useful Welsh phrases with pronunciation
Numbers 1–10
- un
- dau
- tri
- pedwar
- pump
- chwech
- saith
- wyth
- naw
- deg
Days of the week
- Mon Dydd Llun
- Tue Dydd Mawrth
- Wed Dydd Mercher
- Thu Dydd Iau
- Fri Dydd Gwener
- Sat Dydd Sadwrn
- Sun Dydd Sul
Everyday words
- water dŵr
- cat cath
- dog ci
- coffee coffi
- beer cwrw
- bread bara
- book llyfr
Phrases and words checked against Wiktionary; days and months from Unicode CLDR. Audio uses your browser's built-in Welsh voice when available.
Dialects and varieties
North Walian (Gog)
Gwynedd and the north
“Rŵan” for now and “efo” for with.
South Walian (Hwntw)
The south and west
“Nawr” for now and “gyda” for with.
Patagonian Welsh
Chubut, Argentina
Spoken since Welsh settlers arrived in 1865; it borrows Spanish words.
Wenglish
The South Wales valleys
English shaped by Welsh: “I’ll do it now in a minute”.
Hear the dialects
Fun words, untranslatables
hiraeth
A deep longing for home, or for a Wales that may never have been.
pili-pala
Butterfly, one of the most-loved Welsh words.
Curious facts
- Welsh changes the first sound of words after certain words (mutations): cath (cat) becomes ei gath (his cat), ei chath (her cat) and fy nghath (my cat).
- The double l (ll) is a voiceless lateral fricative, the sound in Llanelli and Llandudno.
- The village Llanfairpwllgwyngyll is often given its 58-letter name, coined in the 19th century as a tourist attraction.
- Welsh and English have equal status in Wales under the Welsh Language (Wales) Measure 2011.
- William Morgan's 1588 translation of the Bible is credited with helping Welsh survive as a literary language.
Famous Welsh-speaking voices
Singers & musicians
Writers & poets
Film & TV
Other famous figures
Descriptions from Wikidata; photos from Wikimedia Commons under the licences shown.
Welsh culture now
Pobol y Cwm
Welsh-language television soap opera (since 1974)
Hinterland (TV series)
British police procedural TV series (2013–2016)
Calon Lân
1890s Welsh traditional song
National Eisteddfod of Wales
Annual festival of Welsh-language culture
S4C
Welsh-language public-service television channel
Mwng
2000 studio album by Super Furry Animals
Learn Welsh on YouTube
Free lessons from teachers and channels with Welsh courses. Videos load only when you press play.
The story of the language
Quick quiz: how well do you know Welsh?
Where to learn Welsh
The Endless Book
Read text you can understand, in the style of your favourite author and genre. About 30 languages.
LangMagicLangMagic Speak
Speaking lessons built around your topics, from materials you choose.
LangMagicLangMagic Meet
A virtual meeting platform built for language lessons, with follow-up exercises.
FreeWikivoyage Welsh phrasebook
Free travel phrasebook with pronunciation guide
FreeWikibooks: Welsh
Free, open textbook
FreeOmniglot: Welsh
Script, pronunciation and useful phrases
FreeWiktionary: Welsh dictionary
Free multilingual dictionary
Sources
- Speaker numbers: 2021 census of England and Wales (people aged 3+ in Wales who can speak Welsh), via Wikipedia.
- Countries, populations, alphabets, days and months: Unicode CLDR 46.
- Classification: Glottolog 5.3. Grammar features: WALS Online.
- Introduction: Wikipedia, Welsh language (CC BY-SA 4.0). People and culture: Wikipedia and Wikidata. Images: Wikimedia Commons.
- Writing sample: Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 1, from the Unicode UDHR collection. Phrases and words: Wiktionary. Difficulty: US Foreign Service Institute.
- Map: Natural Earth via world-atlas (public domain).