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PEOPLE GROUP PROFILE

The Tsonga-Shangaan of South Africa

The Tsonga-Shangaan of South Africa, numbering approximately 2,630,000 people, are No Longer Unreached. They are a Bantu ethnolinguistic group indigenous to southern Mozambique and the Limpopo and Mpumalanga provinces of South Africa. They mostly adhere to Protestantism and Tsonga is their primary language.

Photo by Google. (2026). Image generated by Gemini 2.5 Flash: Tsonga-Shangaan

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Sub-Saharan African Peoples
Country: South Africa
People Cluster: Bantu, Central-Southeast
Primary Language(s): Tsonga (tso)
Primary Religion(s): Protestantism
Population: 2,630,000
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): No Longer Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): 2% or Greater but Less than 5% Evangelical
People Group ID: PG015542
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Pray for the Tsonga-Shangaan of South Africa

Join others around the world in praying for the lost to be saved, the gospel to advance, the global Church to grow, and for laborers to be sent out and sustained in the harvest.

Pray Now!
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Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Protestantism
Religious Affiliation: Christianity

—
%
Protestantism Adherents

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Tsonga
Language Family: Atlantic-Congo

100%
%
Tsonga Speakers

Media Resources in Tsonga:

Films:
TitleLink
JESUSView Film

1 film

Provided by the Jesus Film Project

View all resources

Bible Resources in Tsonga:

Bible Name (Translation)VideoAudioText
Sociedade Bíblica de Moçambique, 2014✓✓

1 entry

Provided by Faith Comes by Hearing

Or check out the Tsonga bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

View all resources

SPI: No longer Unreached

The Tsonga-Shangaan are No Longer Unreached, which means there are more than 2% evangelical Christian populations and there are churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice. There is still more to be done among them.

Next steps for the Tsonga-Shangaan:
Empower local believers to begin praying for their own people
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting
Encourage local leaders to being leading church planting strategy and looking for Unreached and Unengaged groups nearby

Pray specifically for the Tsonga-Shangaan of South Africa

The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.
readProverbs 4:19

Pray that lost people will accept salvation through Christ, turn from destruction, and experience joy in the way of righteousness.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.
readPsalm 1:1-2

Pray that God will call out many sons and daughters from among them and give them a deep love for His Word.

You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.
readIsaiah 26:3

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, the Lord will keep them in perfect peace as they trust in Him.

But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
read1 Corinthians 15:10–11

Pray that God's people will preach the message of Jesus' death and resurrection and that it will spread among the lost through the selfless witness of believers.

Tsonga Across Countries (ROP3 - 110220) reported in the following countries:

Strategic Progress Index
All

4 people groups

PhotoPeople Group IDNameCountryPopulationStrategic Progress IndexLanguage ▼Religion
TsongaPG015424TsongaMozambique4,055,000Engaged yet UnreachedTsongaEthnoreligion
Tsonga-ShangaanPG015542Tsonga-ShangaanSouth Africa2,630,000No Longer UnreachedTsongaProtestantism
TsongaPG015560TsongaEswatini28,000No Longer UnreachedTsongaProtestantism
TsongaPG015680TsongaZimbabwe5,500No Longer UnreachedTsongaProtestantism

To download a comprehensive people group list in spreadsheet form, visit our Research Data page.

Peoplegroups.org relies on updates from the field and other organizations for much of our data, so if you have any updates, please contact us. We use various international naming standards. For a list of these standards and fields, visit our Data Standards section.

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