Avar is spoken primarily in the Dagestan region of Russia, with speakers also found in parts of Azerbaijan and Georgia. It is part of the Northeast Caucasian language family. It tends to have very unique linguistic features, but there are several languages that have some similarities—whether through geographic proximity, structural traits, or cultural-historical interactions. According to the eLinguistics.net analysis using specific software modules to assess linguistic relationships, the five languages most similar to Avar are Sindhi, Chechen, Kyrgyz, Kazakh, and Punjabi.
- Sindhi (22.8)
Sindhi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken mainly in Pakistan and India, so it may seem like an unlikely candidate to be the most similar to Avar. However, it shares some intriguing similarities with Avar. Both languages have absorbed a large number of Arabic and Persian loanwords due to Islamic influence. - Chechen (20.2)
Primarily spoken in Chechnya, a close neighbor of Dagestan. As a result, they have some lexical and cultural overlap. Both languages belong to the Northeast Caucasian language family, although they are far different. In addition, both languages use extensive suffixation and complex case systems. - Kyrgyz (20.1)
While linguistically far distant, Kyrgyz and Avar share traits due to historical interactions between Turkic and Caucasian peoples. Kyrgyz is primarily spoken in Kyrgyzstan. In fact, both languages feature agglutinative grammar and vowel harmony. - Kazakh (20.1)
Kazakh is another Turkic language on this list. It is primarily spoken in Kazakhstan. Both Avars and Kazakhs spent decades under Soviet rule. Both have influence from Arabic/Persian (religious) and Russian (modern technical and administrative vocabulary). - Punjabi (20.0)
Like Sindhi, Punjabi is another Indo-Aryan language on this list. It is primarily spoken in the Punjab region of India and Pakistan. Avar and Punjabi have a few interesting points of overlap — mainly from loanwords and some coincidental phonetic resemblances
(to be considered for the list, the language must be spoken by at least one million people)