The Turkmen of Uzbekistan

The Turkmen of Uzbekistan, numbering approximately 227,000 people, are Unengaged and Unreached. They are a Turkic ethnic group indigenous to Central Asia, living mainly in Turkmenistan, with communities in Iran, Afghanistan, and smaller diasporas in Turkey and the Middle East. They mostly adhere to Sunni Islam and Turkmen is their primary language.

Photo by Google. (2025). Image generated by Gemini 2.5 Flash: Turkmen

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Turkic Peoples
Country: Uzbekistan
People Cluster: Turkmen
Primary Language(s): Turkmen (tuk)
Primary Religion(s): Sunni Islam
Population: 227,000
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Recent CP Activity
People Group ID: PG024320
View on Joshua Project

Pray for the Turkmen of Uzbekistan

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.

Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Sunni Islam
Religious Affiliation: Islam

99%
%
Sunni Islam Adherents

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Turkmen
Language Family: Turkic

100%
%
Turkmen Speakers

Media Resources in Turkmen:

Films:
TitleLink
JESUSView Film
JESUSView Film
MagdalenaView Film

3 films

Bible Resources in Turkmen:

Bible Name (Translation)VideoAudioText
2016 Institute for Bible Translation, Moscow✓✓✓
2016 Turkmen Truth✓✓✓

2 entries

Or check out the Turkmen bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

Explore Lostness and Next Steps

Unengaged and Unreached

Strategic Priority Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached (SPI: 0), which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations among which there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.
Lostness Priority Index (LPI): Frontier Unreached People Group, (LPI: 0), < 0.1% Evangelical.
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Recent CP Activity (GSEC: 1), this people group is less than 2% evangelical, some evangelical resources are available, but there has been no active church planting among them within the past two years

Next steps for the Turkmen:
Begin signifcant prayer and fasting for this group
Send cross-cultural teams to discover and research this people group
Begin gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group

Pray specifically for the Turkmen of Uzbekistan

"...And some fell into good soil and grew and yielded a hundredfold." As he said these things, he called out, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
readLuke 8:8

Pray that the seeds of truth will take root in the hearts of those who are far from Jesus and that He will lead them from darkness to light.

And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us.
readActs 17:26-27

Pray that the lost will seek God and find Him, for He is not far from each one of us. Pray that they will have opportunities to access the gospel, learn God's purpose for their lives, and believe in Him.

Sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.
readJohn 17:17

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, they will experience freedom from sin as God sanctifies them in the truth of His Word.

And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”
readRomans 10:15

Pray that God will call many believers who will obediently go and share the gospel with those who desperately need it.

Turkmen Across Countries (ROP3 - 110306) reported in the following countries:

Strategic Progress Index
All

9 people groups

PhotoPeople Group IDNameCountryPopulationStrategic Progress IndexLanguage ▼Religion
TurkmenTurkmenPakistan15,000Engaged yet UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenAfghanistan2,105,000Engaged yet UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenUzbekistan227,000Unengaged and UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenKyrgyzstan2,500Unengaged and UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenTajikistan15,000Engaged yet UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenTurkmenistan5,360,000Engaged yet UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenIran2,785,000Engaged yet UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenUnited States200Unengaged and UnreachedTurkmenSunni Islam
TurkmenTurkmenTurkiye800,000Engaged yet UnreachedTurkishFolk Islam

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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