ISO 639-1 Language Code List

What Is ISO 639-1?

ISO 639-1 is the smallest and most widely implemented tier of the ISO 639 family of language-code standards, assigning a two-letter code to each of the world's most commonly used languages, codes like en for English, fr for French, and ja for Japanese. Its two-letter coding system traces back to a 1967 predecessor standard, ISO/R 639, but ISO 639-1 itself was published in 2002. It's maintained today by ISO, with the International Information Centre for Terminology (Infoterm) serving as the designated Language Coding Agency for this two-letter set. Because the codes are short, stable, and recognized by virtually every browser, operating system, and content management system, ISO 639-1 has become the default choice anywhere software needs to identify what language content is in.

This page lists every current ISO 639-1 code alongside its English and French names.

ISO 639-1 Code Table

wdt_ID ISO 639-1 Code English Name French Name
1 ab Abkhazian abkhaze
2 aa Afar afar
3 af Afrikaans afrikaans
4 ak Akan akan
5 sq Albanian albanais
6 am Amharic amharique
7 ar Arabic arabe
8 an Aragonese aragonais
9 hy Armenian arménien
10 as Assamese assamais
11 av Avaric avar
12 ae Avestan avestique
13 ay Aymara aymara
14 az Azerbaijani azéri
15 bm Bambara bambara
16 ba Bashkir bachkir
17 eu Basque basque
18 be Belarusian biélorusse
19 bn Bengali bengali
20 bi Bislama bichlamar
21 bs Bosnian bosniaque
22 br Breton breton
23 bg Bulgarian bulgare
24 my Burmese birman
25 ca Catalan; Valencian catalan; valencien
26 km Central Khmer khmer central
27 ch Chamorro chamorro
28 ce Chechen tchétchène
29 ny Chichewa; Chewa; Nyanja chichewa; chewa; nyanja
30 zh Chinese chinois
31 cu Church Slavic; Old Slavonic; Church Slavonic; Old Bulgarian; Old Church Slavonic slavon d'église; vieux slave; slavon liturgique; vieux bulgare
32 cv Chuvash tchouvache
33 kw Cornish cornique
34 co Corsican corse
35 cr Cree cree
36 hr Croatian croate
37 cs Czech tchèque
38 da Danish danois
39 dv Divehi; Dhivehi; Maldivian maldivien
40 nl Dutch; Flemish néerlandais; flamand
41 dz Dzongkha dzongkha
42 en English anglais
43 eo Esperanto espéranto
44 et Estonian estonien
45 ee Ewe éwé
46 fo Faroese féroïen
47 fj Fijian fidjien
48 fi Finnish finnois
49 fr French français
50 ff Fulah peul
51 gd Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic gaélique; gaélique écossais
52 gl Galician galicien
53 lg Ganda ganda
54 ka Georgian géorgien
55 de German allemand
56 gn Guarani guarani
57 gu Gujarati goudjrati
58 ht Haitian; Haitian Creole haïtien; créole haïtien
59 ha Hausa haoussa
60 he Hebrew hébreu
61 hz Herero herero
62 hi Hindi hindi
63 ho Hiri Motu hiri motu
64 hu Hungarian hongrois
65 is Icelandic islandais
66 io Ido ido
67 ig Igbo igbo
68 id Indonesian indonésien
69 ia Interlingua (International Auxiliary Language Association) interlingua (langue auxiliaire internationale)
70 ie Interlingue; Occidental interlingue
71 iu Inuktitut inuktitut
72 ik Inupiaq inupiaq
73 ga Irish irlandais
74 it Italian italien
75 ja Japanese japonais
76 jv Javanese javanais
77 kl Kalaallisut; Greenlandic groenlandais
78 kn Kannada kannada
79 kr Kanuri kanouri
80 ks Kashmiri kashmiri
81 kk Kazakh kazakh
82 ki Kikuyu; Gikuyu kikuyu
83 rw Kinyarwanda rwanda
84 ky Kirghiz; Kyrgyz kirghiz
85 kv Komi kom
86 kg Kongo kongo
87 ko Korean coréen
88 kj Kuanyama; Kwanyama kuanyama; kwanyama
89 ku Kurdish kurde
90 lo Lao lao
91 la Latin latin
92 lv Latvian letton
93 li Limburgan; Limburger; Limburgish limbourgeois
94 ln Lingala lingala
95 lt Lithuanian lituanien
96 lu Luba-Katanga luba-katanga
97 lb Luxembourgish; Letzeburgesch luxembourgeois
98 mk Macedonian macédonien
99 mg Malagasy malgache
100 ms Malay malais
101 ml Malayalam malayalam
102 mt Maltese maltais
103 gv Manx manx; mannois
104 mi Maori maori
105 mr Marathi marathe
106 mh Marshallese marshall
107 el Modern Greek (1453-) grec moderne (1453-)
108 mn Mongolian mongol
109 na Nauru nauruan
110 nv Navajo; Navaho navaho
111 ng Ndonga ndonga
112 ne Nepali népalais
113 nd North Ndebele ndébélé du Nord
114 se Northern Sami sami du Nord
115 no Norwegian norvégien
116 nb Norwegian Bokmål norvégien bokmål
117 nn Norwegian Nynorsk norvégien nynorsk
118 oc Occitan (post 1500) occitan (après 1500)
119 oj Ojibwa ojibwa
120 or Oriya oriya
121 om Oromo galla
122 os Ossetian; Ossetic ossète
123 pi Pali pali
124 pa Panjabi; Punjabi pendjabi
125 fa Persian persan
126 pl Polish polonais
127 pt Portuguese portugais
128 ps Pushto; Pashto pachto
129 qu Quechua quechua
130 ro Romanian; Moldavian; Moldovan roumain; moldave
131 rm Romansh romanche
132 rn Rundi rundi
133 ru Russian russe
134 sm Samoan samoan
135 sg Sango sango
136 sa Sanskrit sanskrit
137 sc Sardinian sarde
138 sr Serbian serbe
139 sn Shona shona
140 ii Sichuan Yi; Nuosu yi de Sichuan
141 sd Sindhi sindhi
142 si Sinhala; Sinhalese singhalais
143 sk Slovak slovaque
144 sl Slovenian slovène
145 so Somali somali
146 st Sotho, Southern sotho du Sud
147 nr South Ndebele ndébélé du Sud
148 es Spanish; Castilian espagnol; castillan
149 su Sundanese soundanais
150 sw Swahili swahili
151 ss Swati swati
152 sv Swedish suédois
153 tl Tagalog tagalog
154 ty Tahitian tahitien
155 tg Tajik tadjik
156 ta Tamil tamoul
157 tt Tatar tatar
158 te Telugu télougou
159 th Thai thaï
160 bo Tibetan tibétain
161 ti Tigrinya tigrigna
162 to Tonga (Tonga Islands) tongan (Îles Tonga)
163 ts Tsonga tsonga
164 tn Tswana tswana
165 tr Turkish turc
166 tk Turkmen turkmène
167 tw Twi twi
168 ug Uighur; Uyghur ouïgour
169 uk Ukrainian ukrainien
170 ur Urdu ourdou
171 uz Uzbek ouszbek
172 ve Venda venda
173 vi Vietnamese vietnamien
174 vo Volapük volapük
175 wa Walloon wallon
176 cy Welsh gallois
177 fy Western Frisian frison occidental
178 wo Wolof wolof
179 xh Xhosa xhosa
180 yi Yiddish yiddish
181 yo Yoruba yoruba
182 za Zhuang; Chuang zhuang; chuang
183 zu Zulu zoulou
ISO 639-1 Code English Name French Name

Source: Library of Congress – ISO 639-2 Registration Authority, ISO-639-2_utf-8.txt. Retrieved 2026-09-11.

How ISO 639-1 Fits with ISO 639-2 and ISO 639-3

ISO 639 is maintained as a family of related parts rather than a single list, each aimed at a different level of coverage. ISO 639-1 (this page) covers roughly the 180-odd languages with the largest number of speakers or the most institutional use. ISO 639-2 extends that to three-letter codes, adding bibliographic and language-collection codes used mainly in library systems. ISO 639-3, maintained by SIL International, extends coverage further still to every documented living and extinct human language. In practice, every ISO 639-1 code has a corresponding code at both of those tiers, but the reverse isn't true: most languages only have a code at the 639-2 or 639-3 level. Two more parts round out the family: ISO 639-4 sets the general principles for how the standard works rather than assigning codes, and ISO 639-5 assigns codes to language families and groups instead of individual languages. The Library of Congress is the designated Language Coding Agency for ISO 639-2 and ISO 639-5, operating under the shared ISO 639 Maintenance Agency that governs how all the parts relate to one another.

Where ISO 639-1 Codes Are Used

ISO 639-1 codes are the go-to standard anywhere software needs a compact way to identify a language: the lang attribute in HTML (<html lang="en">), hreflang annotations that tell search engines which language and region a page targets, localization and internationalization (i18n) file naming and metadata, and the locale settings built into browsers and operating systems.

One practical note for localization work: don't assume a two-letter code is precise enough for content targeting. en alone doesn't distinguish U.S. from U.K. English, and zh doesn't distinguish Simplified from Traditional Chinese. When region or script matters, which it usually does for hreflang and locale-specific translation, pair the ISO 639-1 code with an ISO 3166-1 region subtag and, where needed, an ISO 15924 script subtag, inside a full BCP 47 tag, such as en-GB or zh-Hant-TW.

Related ISO 639 Code Resources

Each tier of the ISO 639 family fits a different use case. These companion pages cover the other three:

Frequently Asked Questions

How Many Languages Does ISO 639-1 Cover, and Why Isn't Every Language on It?

ISO 639-1 currently defines 183 codes. That's a deliberately small set: it's the most-common-languages-only tier of the ISO 639 family, intended to cover the languages most frequently referenced in software, publishing, and international standards rather than every language spoken on Earth. Languages without a two-letter code aren't unrecognized by ISO; they simply live in the larger three-letter ISO 639-2 or comprehensive ISO 639-3 tiers instead.

Is ISO 639-1 the Same as BCP 47?

No. BCP 47 is a broader language-tagging standard that combines an ISO 639 language subtag with optional ISO 15924 script and ISO 3166-1 region subtags, producing tags like en-US or zh-Hant-TW. ISO 639-1 only supplies the language part of that tag; BCP 47 is what you use when you also need to specify region or script.

Is ISO 639-1 the Same as ISO 3166 Country Codes?

No, though the two-letter length causes frequent confusion. ISO 639-1 codes identify languages, while ISO 3166-1 codes identify countries and regions: separate standards for separate things. A concrete example of the mix-up: hm is not an ISO 639-1 language code, and you won't find it anywhere in the table above. HM is actually the ISO 3166-1 country code for Heard Island and McDonald Islands, a remote Australian external territory. Likewise, en is the ISO 639-1 code for the English language, while GB and US are ISO 3166-1 codes for the United Kingdom and United States as countries, not for a language spoken across many countries.

How Do I Find the ISO 639-1 Code for a Specific Language?

Use the search box above the table. It matches against both the code and the language name, so typing part of either filters the list. For example, searching "Spanish" surfaces es, "Quechua" surfaces qu, "Greek" surfaces el, listed as Modern Greek, "Georgian" surfaces ka, and "Hungarian" surfaces hu. You can also click any column header to sort alphabetically by code or by name.

Does Hmong Have an ISO 639-1 Code?

No. Hmong doesn't have a two-letter ISO 639-1 code at all. At the ISO 639-2 level, Hmong is covered by the macrolanguage code hmn, but individual Hmong varieties are only distinguished once you go down to the ISO 639-3 tier, which is built to register that level of detail.

Why Does This Table Show Language Names in English and French?

Every entry in this table carries a name in both English and French because those are ISO's two official languages for publishing its standards, not because the underlying language set is limited to those two. The Library of Congress, which maintains the source file this page is built from, publishes ISO 639-1 names bilingually as a matter of ISO convention. The 183 codes themselves still cover major and minor languages from every region of the world, entirely independent of what language their labels happen to be written in.

Do I Need to Know a Language's ISO 639-1 Code to Use Boostlingo's List of Supported Languages?

No. Boostlingo's list of supported languages is organized by language name, not by ISO code, so you don't need to look one up to find what's available.