People of Iran are of diverse ethnic groups. So, the languages that are spoken in Iran are entirely distinct. Although there are a wide range of differences within the population of Iran, the country has only one official language which is Persian. The majority of the population speaks Persian language.
The Persian language is also known as Farsi. It belongs to Indo-European language family and is a branch of Indo-Iranian subgroup. The origin of Persian language dates back to Old Persian language of Achaemedian Empire. People of some other countries speak Persian as well. Persian is also the official language of Afghanistan and Tajikistan. According to the statistics, almost 53 percent of the population of Iran speaks Persian language.
As Iran is a multicultural country, the number of languages that can be heard in the country is a lot. Some of them include Turkic languages and dialects, Kurdish, Gilaki and Mazandarani, Luri, Arabic and Balochi.
One of the most commonly spoken Turkic in Iran is Azerbaijani. The majority of people who speak this language are concentrated in the northwest area of the country that is known as Azarbaijan.
Kurds of Iran speak the Kurdish Language. This language belongs to the Northwestern Iranian subgroup of the Indo-European language family. Although concentrated in the northwestern region of this country, it does have some similar characteristics with the Persian language, which is concentrated in the southwestern region of Iran. This language is further divided into 3 groups: Northern, which is spoken in the northwestern area; Central, which is spoken in the Kurdistan Province; and Southern, which is spoken in the Kermanshah and Ilam provinces.
Arabic is mainly spoken by Arabs of Khuzestan; a province which is located in southwest of the country. Luri as a widely spoken language in Iran is spoken by Lurs who are dispersed in different parts of the country. People of Sistan and Blochestan province in south east of the country mainly speak Balochi as their first language, they can speak Persian though.
A few minority languages are also spoken in different parts of Iran; such as Hebrew, Armanian and Georgian. The total share of the speakers of all these languages amounts to a total percentage of 1 percent in the entire country.
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