- ISO 3166
AF- Primary locale
fa-AF- Currency
- AFN · Afghan Afghani
- Region
- MENAP
Afghanistan
Afghanistan has 40.1M people, and 6.5M of them are online. Persian is the most widely spoken language at 50%, one of 7 languages CLDR lists here. Persian and Pashto are official nationally, and Uzbek and Turkmen are official in part of the territory. A product shipping here defaults to fa-AF.
At a glance
Each figure is drawn against the rest of the world, so a number means something before you have any other market to compare it with.
People online
6.5M
0%world median 81%100%
16% of 40.1M people use the internet, per the World Bank's 2024 figure. CLDR population multiplied by that share, so read it as an estimate rather than a headcount.
Income per person
$417
Higher than 0% of 213 territories
GDP per capita in current US dollars, World Bank Open Data, most recent reported year. A rough guide to what people can spend, not what your product will earn.
Can pay online
10%
0%world median 71%100%
Adults aged 15 and over holding a bank or mobile-money account, World Bank Global Findex 2021. Below half means a card-only checkout excludes most of the market.
Languages
7
Persian 50% · Pashto 43% · Hazaragi 6%
Languages CLDR records here with a share of 0.1% or more. 2 of them are official nationally.
English proficiency
446
Very lowVery high
Very low proficiency on the EF EPI 2025 scale. The sample is self-selected online test takers, so treat it as colour for a discussion. It never enters any score on this site.
Adult literacy
28%
0%world median 95%100%
Share of adults who can read, as recorded in CLDR territory data. Low literacy shifts a product toward icons, audio, and video before it shifts toward another language.
What people speak
Shares count first and second languages, so they sum past 100% and one bilingual person is counted twice.
Most spoken in Afghanistan
share of 40.1M people
- Persianofficial50%20.1M
- Pashtoofficial43%17.3M
- Hazaragi6%2.4M
- Uzbekregional5%1.9M
- Turkmenregional2%682.1K
- Parsi-Dari1%481.5K
- Western Balochi0.6%252.8K
Filled bars are nationally official languages. Every bar is drawn against the largest language rather than against 100%, so a 1% language stays visible.
One country understates a language. CLDR records diaspora too, so a language usually reaches further than any single page shows. The language profiles show each one's full footprint.
What you would ship
Configuration for day one, computed live with Intl.* against fa-AF, the dominant locale for this market.
Plural categories
2
Standard. Use Intl.PluralRules for the few cases that matter.
Script family
Arabic
Bundle a Noto-class webfont that covers this script. OS defaults vary.
Reading direction
Right-to-left
Use logical CSS properties (padding-inline-start, etc.). Wrap interpolated LTR with <bdi> or FSI/PDI.
Date
۱ ثور ۱۴۰۵
Short: ۱۴۰۵/۲/۱
Time
۱۸:۳۰
Week starts Sat
Currency
؋ ۱٬۲۳۵
1,234.56 in AFN · Afghan Afghani
The engineering behind the flags: Bidirectional text: why the dollar sign wanders in an RTL string · RTL layouts: what flips and what doesn't · Font fallback: why the OS picks the wrong glyphs for this script