Zimbabwe, a landlocked country in South East Africa, is separated from Zambia by the Zambezi River. The Limpopo River in the south forms part of the border with South Africa, it is bordered in the east by Mozambique, and in the west by Botswana. The Namibia-Zambia-Botswana tripoint at the town of Kazungula lies about 100 meters from the Zimbabwe border and as such Namibia almost borders Zimbabwe.
Map of Zimbabwe and its neighboring countries.
Africa is the most linguistically diverse continent on Earth. As such, its countries are worthy of close inspection when it comes to their languages.
Zimbabwe has 16 official languages, setting the world record for the most official languages in a country. The top three most spoken languages are Shona, Ndebele, and English. Additionally, the country recognizes 13 minority official languages: Tonga, Tswana, Kalanga, Venda, Koisan, Shangai, Ndau, Chibarwe, Nambya, Xhosa, Chewa, Sign Language, and Sotho.
The 16 languages of Zimbabwe were given official status when they were codified by Zimbabwe's new constitution in May 2013. That moment marked the impact of centuries of history in Zimbabwe, with political and demographic factors majorly influencing the country’s linguistic landscape. Today, languages in Zimbabwe showcase the country’s history and the diversity of its population.
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According to the decision-makers over at Guinness, it’s because in Zimbabwe official languages are recognised as languages of the country as a whole. India, conversely, recognizes its languages as being associated with certain areas of the country.
Let’s spend a bit of time looking at what languages are spoken in Zimbabwe. To understand the country’s linguistic makeup, we’ll take a look at everything from history to education.
The Major Languages of Zimbabwe
Shona
What language is spoken in Zimbabwe more than any other? That would be Shona. 80.9% of people in Zimbabwe speak Shona natively, due to the historic influence of the Shona tribe and the ongoing importance of Shona culture. (Note that speaker numbers in this article are estimates, as Zimbabwe doesn’t conduct a census that counts speaker numbers of its different languages).
The Shona people ruled much of what is now Zimbabwe for centuries. Their influence began to spread in the 9th century and by the 13th they had gained control of the area, a position that they remained in through to the 19th century. This is why Shona is so important in terms of Zimbabwe languages to this day.
Today, the Shona people live mainly in central and eastern areas of Zimbabwe. Shona is a Bantu language that has five main dialects. They are Karanga, Korekore, Manyika, Ndau and Zezuru. The Latin alphabet is used when writing Shona and punctuation is the same as that used when writing English.
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Ndebele
While the most used of the Zimbabwe official languages is Shona, Ndebele is also hugely important in terms of Zimbabwean culture and history. In terms of Zimbabwe official languages, Ndebele is the second most spoken, with 11.5% of people in the country speaking it as their first language.
A Bantu language descended from Zulu (85% of the two languages’ lexicon is shared), Ndebele is today spoken mainly in western Zimbabwe, in Matabeleland province. It became a key part of Zimbabwe’s history in the early 19th century, when speakers migrated from KwaZulu, conquering the Shona and embedding their language in what is now Zimbabwe.
Interestingly, Ndebele goes by a number of names. Its speakers call it isiNdebele, while it was formerly known as Matabele. It is also referred to as Northern Ndebele and Zimbabwean Ndebele, differentiating it from the language known as Ndebele that is spoken in South Africa. Though the two share the same name, they are different languages.
English
British colonists arrived in Zimbabwe in significant numbers in 1888, bringing their language with them. Today, Zimbabwean English is a regional dialect of English that is spoken natively by around 0.3% of the population of Zimbabwe.
Despite this low level of first language speakers, of all the Zimbabwe official languages English is the one that is used for conducting official business and for schooling (though other languages are also used, depending on the region in question).
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Minority Languages of Zimbabwe
Another of the Zimbabwe languages contributing to the country’s world record is Tonga. Also known as Chitonga, isiTonga, and Zambezi, this Bantu language has around 1.5 million native speakers in total, located in northern Zimbabwe, as well as in Zambia and Mozambique. Many Zimbabweans also speak it as a second or third language. Tonga is not a standardized language.
While not a Zimbabwe main language, Tswana is nevertheless an important language there. It is also spoken across other parts of southern Africa, where it has around 8.2 million speakers in total.
Another of the official languages spoken in Zimbabwe, Kalanga is a Bantu language that includes whistled sibilants and palatalised, velarised, aspirated and breathy-voiced consonants. Venda is another of the Bantu Zimbabwe languages.
Known outside Zimbabwe as Tshwa, Koisan is one of the 16 official languages of Zimbabwe. The languages of Zimbabwe also include Shangani, which is also called Tsonga and Xitsonga by its speakers. Shangani is spoken in southeastern areas of Zimbabwe.
One language is spoken in Zimbabwe that is sometimes classed as a dialect of Shona is Ndau (though it is recognized as a language in its own right by Zimbabwe’s constitution). Chibarwe is a Bantu language that is also known as both Sena and Barwe.
A Zimbabwe national language that is spoken in northwestern Zimbabwe (and in particular in the town of Hwange), Nambya is a close relative of Kalanga. Xhosa is another Zimbabwe native language that is recognized by the country’s constitution. Around 200,000 Zimbabweans speak it natively. Xhosa is known for having a great many click consonants, with these used in around 10% of basic vocabulary.
Chewa is one of the more widely spoken languages of Zimbabwe. Refreshingly and unlike many other countries, Zimbabwe recognizes sign language as one of its official languages. However, it doesn’t specify which sign language is the official one; research by the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History lists Zimbabwe as having no less than seven. A small number of Sotho speakers reside in Zimbabwe, though the language is more widely spoken in Lesotho and South Africa.
Zimbabwe is home to other languages, in addition to the 16 recognised by its constitution. Around 70,000 Zimbabweans speak Loki, for example, while some 800,000 speak Manyika (which is often classified as a dialect of Shona). Tjwao, meanwhile, has just 20 native speakers, located in Zimbabwe’s Tsholotsho District. They are all aged 60+.
Immigrant languages are also spoken in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe’s languages fall into three main groups. The majority of the country’s languages belong to the Bantu language family tree.
While some of Zimbabwe’s languages are used across much of the country, others have localized pockets of speakers. Like the languages of so many countries in the planet’s most linguistically diverse region, languages in Zimbabwe have huge political, historical, and cultural connotations.
Demographic Snapshot
Here is a table summarizing the language statistics in Zimbabwe:
| Language | Percentage of Speakers (2022 est.) |
|---|---|
| Shona (official) | 80.9% |
| Ndebele (official) | 11.5% |
| Ndau | 2.7% |
| Tonga | 1.7% |
| Shangani | 0.8% |
| Venda | 0.5% |
| Kalanga | 0.4% |
| English (official) | 0.3% |
| Other (including Chewa, Chibarwe, Koisan, Nambya, Sotho, Tswana, Xhosa) | 1.2% |
English is the primary language used in education, administration, law and commerce, and the majority of Zimbabweans speak English as a second language.
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