Editing ISO 639-1

{{Short description|Standard codes for identifying languages}}
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| style="text-align:center" | Enter an ISO 639-1 code to find the corresponding language article
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'''ISO 639-1:2002''', ''Codes for the representation of names of languages—Part 1: Alpha-2 code'', is the first part of the [[ISO 639]] series of [[International Organization for Standardization|international standards]] for [[language code]]s. Part 1 covers the registration of "set 1" two-letter codes. There are 183 two-letter codes registered as of June 2021. The registered codes cover the world's major languages.

Some languages do not have the ISO 639-1 codes because the standard was initially designed to represent major and primary national languages with well-established terminologies and lexicography. The ISO 639-1 is more restrictive than other ISO 639 standards, such as ISO 639-2 as well as ISO 639-3, which cover a wider range of languages and variations. 

These codes are a useful international and formal shorthand for indicating languages.
<!-- Please do not add additional examples unless they demonstrate a pattern not already shown in the table and it has been discussed on the talk page -->
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; margin: 1em auto 1em auto"
|+ Examples of ISO 639-1 codes
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! Code !! English !! French !! German !! [[Endonym]]
|-
| <code>en</code> || [[English language|English]] || {{lang|fr|anglais|italic=no}} || {{lang|de|Englisch|italic=no}} || {{lang|en|English|italic=no}}<!-- Example of a code using two consecutive letters of the English language name -->
|-
| <code>es</code>|| [[Spanish language|Spanish]] || {{lang|fr|espagnol|italic=no}} || {{lang|de|Spanisch|italic=no}} || {{lang|es|español|italic=no}}<!-- Example of a code using two consecutive letters of the endonym (as well as a non-English ISO 639-1 language name) -->
|-
| <code>pt</code>|| [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]] || {{lang|fr|portugais|italic=no}} || {{lang|de|Portugiesisch|italic=no}} || {{lang|pt|português|italic=no}}<!-- Example of a code using two nonconsecutive letters -->
|}

Many multilingual websites use these codes to prefix URLs of specific language versions of their websites, for example, "ua." before the website name is the Ukrainian version of that website. See also [[IETF language tag]]. (Two-letter country-specific [[List of Internet top-level domains#Country code top-level domains|top-level-domain]] code suffixes are often different from these language-tag prefixes.)

ISO 639, the original standard for language codes, was approved in 1967. It was split into parts, and in 2002 ISO 639-1 became the new revision of the original standard. The last code added was <code>ht</code>, representing [[Haitian Creole]] on 2003-02-26. The use of the standard was encouraged by [[IETF language tag]]s, introduced in RFC 1766 in March 1995, and continued by RFC 3066 from January 2001 and RFC 4646 from September 2006.  The current version is [http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5646#ref-ISO639-1 RFC&nbsp;5646] from September 2009. [[Infoterm]] (International Information Center for Terminology) is the registration authority for ISO 639-1 codes.

New ISO 639-1 codes are not added if an [[ISO 639-2]] "set 2" three-letter code exists, so systems that use ISO 639-1 and 639-2 codes, with 639-1 codes preferred, do not have to change existing codes.<ref>[https://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/iso639jac_n3r.html ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee - Working principles for ISO 639 maintenance]</ref>

If an ISO 639-2 code that covers a group of languages is used, it might be overridden for some specific languages by a new ISO 639-1 code.

Part 3 (2007) of the standard, [[ISO 639-3]], aiming to cover all known [[natural language]]s, largely supersedes the [[ISO 639-2]] three-letter code standard.

{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center; margin: 1em auto 1em auto"
|+ ISO 639-1 codes added after RFC publication in January 2001
! ISO 639-1 !! ISO 639-2 !! Name !! Date added !! Previously covered by
|-
| <code>io</code> || <code>ido</code> || [[Ido]] || 2002-01-15<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/iso639-1/io.html|title=ISO639-1 Languages: Ido|publisher=Library of Congress}}</ref> || <code>art</code>
|-
| <code>wa</code> || <code>wln</code> || [[Walloon language|Walloon]] || 2002-01-29<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/iso639-1/wa.html|title=ISO639-1 Languages: Walloon|publisher=Library of Congress}}</ref> || <code>roa</code>
|-
| <code>li</code> || <code>lim</code> || [[Limburgish]] || 2002-08-02<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/iso639-1/li.html|title=ISO639-1 Languages: Limburgan|publisher=Library of Congress}}</ref> || <code>gem</code>
|-
| <code>ii</code> || <code>iii</code> || [[Nuosu language|Sichuan Yi]] || 2002-10-14<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/iso639-1/ii.html|title=ISO639-1 Languages: Sichuan Yi|publisher=Library of Congress}}</ref> || <code>sit</code>
|-
| <code>an</code> || <code>arg</code> || [[Aragonese language|Aragonese]] || 2002-12-23<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/iso639-1/an.html|title=ISO639-1 Languages: Aragonese|publisher=Library of Congress}}</ref> || <code>roa</code>
|-
| <code>ht</code> || <code>hat</code> || [[Haitian Creole]] || 2003-02-26<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/iso639-1/ht.html|title=ISO639-1 Languages: Haitian|publisher=Library of Congress}}</ref> || <code>cpf</code>
|}

There is no specification on treatment of [[ISO 639 macrolanguage|macrolanguages]] (see [[ISO 639-3]]).

==See also==
* [[Lists of ISO 639 codes]]
* [[ISO 3166-1 alpha-2]], a different set of two-letter codes used for countries

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [http://www.iso.org/iso/home/standards/language_codes.htm ISO 639]
* [http://www.infoterm.info/standardization/iso_639_1_2002.php ISO 639-1/RA]
* [https://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/faq.html#13 ISO 639-2 Registration Authority FAQ]

{{Footer ISO 639}}
{{ISO standards}}

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[[Category:ISO 639]]
[[Category:Language identifiers]]