Punjabi is natively spoken by about 152 million people, primarily in the Punjab regions of India and Pakistan, where it is an official language. It is integral to Punjabi cultural identity, known for its folk traditions, Bhangra music and dance, and religious diversity, with significant Sikh and Sufi influences. Written in the Gurmukhi script (in India) and Shahmukhi script (in Pakistan), Punjabi grammar features a subject-object-verb (SOV) word order, postpositions, and a system of verb conjugations that indicate tense, aspect, and mood.
Stats
Language Family: Indo-European
Writing System: Gurmukhi, Perso-Arabic / other form
Writing System Type: Abugida, Abjad
Writing Direction: L to R / R to L
Tones / Pitch Accent: 3
Morphology: Fusional
Cases: 6
Grammatical Gender / Noun Class: 2
Number of Verb Tenses: 3
Word Order: SOV
Number of Vowels (Monophthongs): 10
Number of Consonants: 27
Areas Where Spoken
India (2.8%) (39.9 mil)
Pakistan (48.0%) (113 mil)
Resources
Resource Lists
Lessons
elearnpunjabi.com - Video Lessons
GLOSS - Audio and transcript
Overview of Punjabi Grammar - Grammar guide
Wikibooks’ Punjabi - Script, vocab and grammar
Phrasebook
Book2 - Phrasebook course with audio
Reading
Storybooks Pakistan - Graded level children's stories with autoplay Punjabi audio
Radio
Dictionary
Shabdkosh - EN<=>PA dictionary
YouTube
CosmicTutoring - Basics of Punjabi, Vocab, Grammar