Transnistria Language

The official language in Transnistria, that spoken by the government, is Russian. Russian is also the most widely spoken language, with two other main languages being Moldovan (same as Romanian more or less) and Ukrainian. Nevertheless, everyone in Transnistria knows how to speak Russian.

Some people especially in the capital Tiraspol, know English but you will be ahead of the game if you can speak at least a little Russian as it is used everywhere, stores, taxis, bars and the few hotels that exist there.

Moldovan and Ukranian are also spoken by quite a lot of people, but not nearly so many people speak these as they do Russian.

Possibly because Transnistria appears to want to reunite with Russia, the language and alphabet used in spelling words has often been a bone of contention in the past. Moldovan (Romanian) is written using the Latin alphabet, the same as English, while Russian is written using the Cyrillic alphabet – but Moldovan in Transnistria is spelled the Russian way, using the Cyrillic alphabet, which causes a little upset to many Moldovans.