There are a large number of different varieties of Tibetan, and it is sometimes said that every valley has its own language. However, in practice, Tibetan is usually divided into three categories, corresponding to the three ཆོལ་ཁ་ of Tibet:
- Ütsang dialect
- Kham dialect
- Amdo dialect
Each of these varieties has over 1 million speakers, which makes them the most widely spoken varieties in the entire Tibetic language family.
Source: Nicolas Tournadre and Hiroyuki Suzuki, 2023. The Tibetic Languages: an introduction to the family of languages derived from Old Tibetan, Villejuif, LACITO-Publications, Series Linguistic Diversity, 1151 p. 17 maps, ISBN : 978-2-490768-08-0
