The Sino-Tibetan family, both numerically and in the extent of its distribution, is by far the most prominent; within this family, Han Chinese is the most widely spoken language. Although unified by their tradition—the written ideographic characters of their language as well as many other cultural traits—the Han speak several mutually unintelligible dialects and display marked regional differences. By far the most important Chinese tongue is Mandarin, or putonghua, meaning “ordinary language” or “common language.” There are three variants of Mandarin. The first of these is the northern variant, of which the Beijing dialect, or Beijing hua, is typical and which is spoken to the north of the Qin Mountains–Huai River line; as the most widespread Chinese tongue, it has officially been adopted as the basis for a national language. The second is the western variant, also known as the Chengdu or Upper Yangtze variant; this is spoken in the Sichuan Basin and in adjoining parts of southwestern China. The third is the southern variant, also known as the Nanjing or Lower Yangtze variant, which is spoken in northern Jiangsu and in southern and central Anhui. Some authorities also recognize a fourth variant, Northwestern, which is used in most of northwestern China. Related to Mandarin are the Hunan, or Xiang, language, spoken by people in central and southern Hunan, and the Gan dialect. The Huizhou language, spoken in southern Anhui, forms an enclave within the southern Mandarin area.

Less intelligible to Mandarin speakers are the dialects of the southeast coastal region, stretching from Shanghai to Guangzhou (Canton). The most important of these is the Wu language, spoken in southern Jiangsu and in Zhejiang. This is followed, to the south, by the Fuzhou, or Northern Min, language of northern and central Fujian and by the Xiamen-Shantou (Amoy-Swatow), or Southern Min, language of southern Fujian and easternmost Guangdong. The Hakka language of southernmost Jiangxi and northeastern Guangdong has a rather scattered pattern of distribution. Probably the best known of these southern dialects is Yue, particularly Cantonese, which is spoken in central and western Guangdong, Hong Kong, and in southern Guangxi—a dialect area in which a large proportion of overseas Chinese originated.

In addition to the Han, the Manchu and the Hui (Chinese Muslims) also speak Mandarin and use the Chinese writing system. The Hui, firm adherents of Islam, are descendants of Persian and Central Asian Muslims who traveled to China as merchants, soldiers, and scholars and intermarried with several Chinese nationalities. They are intermingled with the Han throughout much of the country and are distinguished as Hui only in the area of their heaviest concentration, the Hui Autonomous Region of Ningxia. Other Hui communities are organized as autonomous prefectures (zizhizhou) in Xinjiang and as autonomous counties (zizhixian) in Qinghai, Hebei, Guizhou, and Yunnan. Increasingly, the Hui have been moving from their scattered settlements into the area of major concentration, possibly in order to facilitate intermarriage with other Muslims.

The Manchu claim that they are descendants of the Manchu warriors who invaded China in the 17th century and founded the Qing dynasty (1644–1911/12). Manchu is virtually a dead language—though it is closely related to Sibo (or Xibe), which is still vital—and the Manchu have been completely assimilated into Han Chinese culture. They are found mainly in North China and the Northeast, but they form no separate autonomous areas above the commune level.

The Zhuang (Zhuangjia) are China’s largest minority group. Most of them live in the Zhuang Autonomous Region of Guangxi. They are also found in national autonomous areas in neighboring Yunnan and Guangdong. They depend mainly on rice cultivation for their livelihood. In religion the Zhuang are animists, worshipping particularly the spirits of their ancestors. Members of the Buyi (Zhongjia) group are concentrated in southern Guizhou, where they share an autonomous prefecture with the Miao (Hmong) group. The Dong people are settled in small communities in Guangxi and Guizhou; they share with the Miao group an autonomous prefecture set up in southeast Guizhou in 1956.

Tibetans are distributed over the entire Qinghai-Tibetan highland region. Outside Tibet, Tibetan minorities are found in five Tibetan autonomous prefectures in Qinghai, two in Sichuan, and one each in Yunnan and Gansu. The Tibetans still maintain their tribal characteristics, but few of them are nomadic. Though essentially farmers, they also raise livestock and, like other tribal peoples in the Chinese far west, hunt to supplement their food supply. The major religion of Tibet has been Tibetan Buddhism since about the 17th century; before 1959 the social and political institutions of this region were still based largely on that faith. Many of the Yi (Lolo) are concentrated in two autonomous prefectures—one in southern Sichuan and another in northern Yunnan. They raise crops and sometimes keep flocks and herds.

The Miao-Yao (Hmong-Mien) peoples, with their major concentration in Guizhou, are distributed throughout the central south and southwestern provinces and are found also in some small areas in eastern China. They are subdivided into many rather distinct groupings. Most of them have now lost their traditional tribal practices through the influence of the Han, and it is only their language that serves to distinguish them. Two-thirds of the Miao are settled in Guizhou, where they share two autonomous prefectures with the Dong and Buyi groups. The Yao people are concentrated in the Guangxi-Guangdong-Hunan border area.

In some areas of China, especially in the southwest, many different ethnic groups are geographically intermixed. Because of language barriers and different economic structures, these peoples all maintain their own cultural traits and live in relative isolation from one another. The Han are active in the towns and fertile river valleys of some of these locales, while the minority peoples continue to base their livelihood on more-traditional forms of agriculture or on grazing their livestock on hillsides and mountains. The vertical distribution of these peoples is in zones—usually the higher they live, the less complex their way of life. In former times they did not mix well with one another, but now, with highways penetrating deep into their settlements, they have better opportunities to communicate with other groups and have benefited from improved living conditions.