Mandarin
官話/官话, Guānhuà
Guānhuà (Mandarin) written in Chinese characters
Region	Most of Northern and Southwestern China (see also Standard Chinese)
Native speakers	955 million  (2010)
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Sinitic Chinese Mandarin
Early forms:	Old Chinese Middle Chinese Old Mandarin Mandarin
Dialects	Northeastern Beijing Ji-Lu Jiao-Liao Lower Yangtze Central Plains Lan-Yin Southwestern Jin (sometimes a separate group)
Writing system	Traditional Chinese Simplified Chinese Mainland Chinese Braille Taiwanese Braille Two-Cell Chinese Braille
Language codes
ISO 639-3	cmn
Linguasphere	79-AAA-b
Mandarin area, with Jin (sometimes treated as a separate group) in light green

Mandarin Chinese, or simply Mandarin, (/ˈmændərɪn/ ( listen); simplified Chinese: 官话; traditional Chinese: 官話; pinyin: Guānhuà; literally "speech of officials") is the language of government and education of the Chinese mainland and Taiwan, with the notable exceptions of Hong Kong and Macau where a local dialect of Chinese called Cantonese is more often used.