South Africa guide › South Africa at a glance
What language do they speak in South Africa?
Twelve official languages, but you only need one to travel: English. It's the language of government, road signs, hotels, restaurants and safari guides, and you'll hear it everywhere, even though relatively few South Africans speak it at home.
It's one of the richest language landscapes in the world. In the 2022 census, isiZulu was the most common home language (24%), ahead of isiXhosa (16%) and Afrikaans (11%), with English only fifth at around 9%. South African Sign Language became the twelfth official language in 2023.
What you'll hear, and where:
- Afrikaans, which grew out of Dutch, is widely spoken in the Western and Northern Cape. You'll see it on signs: strand (beach), uitsig (viewpoint).
- isiZulu in KwaZulu-Natal (Durban, the Drakensberg) and Johannesburg.
- isiXhosa in the Eastern Cape and Cape Town's townships: Nelson Mandela's language, famous for its click sounds.
- Sesotho, Setswana, Sepedi, Xitsonga, Tshivenda and more across the centre and north.
A few words always go down well: sawubona (hello, in isiZulu), molo (hello, in isiXhosa), dankie (thanks, in Afrikaans). South African English has its own traps too: a robot is a traffic light, a braai is a barbecue, and just now means "later", possibly much later; if you want "right away", that's now now.
Tip: if you're not a confident English speaker, download English for offline use in your translation app before you go: in the parks, mobile signal often disappears between camps.
Information checked in November 2026; double-check before you travel.