Zulu, known as isiZulu in its native form, is a Southern Bantu language belonging to the Nguni branch, spoken in Southern Africa. It serves as the language of the Zulu people, boasting around 12 million native speakers, mainly concentrated in the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. Zulu is both the most widely spoken first language (23% of the population) and the most spoken language overall (46% of the population) in South Africa. It gained recognition as one of South Africa's 11 official languages in 1994.
