Spoken or Colloquial Arabic

Spoken or Colloquial Arabic

"Colloquial Arabic" is a collective term for the spoken languages or dialects of people throughout the Arab world which differ radically from the literary language. The main dialectal division is between the Maghreb dialects and those of the Middle East. Maltese, though descended from Arabic, is considered a separate language. Speakers of some of these dialects are unable to understand speakers of other Arabic dialects.

The major Arabic language groups are:

• Egyptian Arabic - (Egypt)
• Maghreb Arabic - (Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Western Libya)
• Hassaniya - (in Mauritania and Western Sahara)
• Maltese - (Malta)
• Sudanese Arabic - (Sudan with a dialect continuum into Chad)
• Levantine Arabic - (Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Western Jordan)
• Iraqi Arabic - (Iraq, Syria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia)
• Gulf Arabic - (Gulf coast from Iraq to Oman)
• Hijazi Arabic - (West Coast of Saudi Arabia, Northern Saudi Arabia, Eastern Jordan, Western Iraq)
• Najdi Arabic - (Najd region of central Saudi Arabia)
• Yemeni Arabic (Yemen to Southern Saudi Arabia)

The top Arabic dialects or languages, in terms of number of speakers are:

1. Egyptian - spoken in Egypt - approx. 46 million speakers
2. Algerian - spoken in Algeria - approx. 24 million speakers
3. Moroccan/Maghrebi - spoken in Morocco - approx. 20 million speakers
4. Sudanese - spoken in the Sudan - approx. 19 million speakers
5. Saidi - spoken in Egypt - approx 19 million speakers
6. North Levantine - spoken in Lebanon and Syria - approx. 15 million speakers
7. Mesopotamian - spoken in Iraq, Iran and Syria - approx. 14 million speakers
8. Najdi - spoken in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan and Syria - 14 million speakers

This table shows Arabic dialects and where they are spoken.

Although related to each other, Arabic dialects are not always mutually understandable. This gets worse the further apart the regions are e.g., Arabic-speaking Moroccans might not be able to talk easily with Arabic-speaking Yemenis.