Punjabi
Americannoun
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Punjabis
plural
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a native or inhabitant of the Punjab.
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an Indic language of the Punjab.
adjective
noun
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a member of the chief people of the Punjab
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the state language of the Punjab, belonging to the Indic branch of the Indo-European family
adjective
Usage
What does Punjabi mean? A Punjabi is a person who is from or lives in Punjab, a former UK province. Punjabi is also the language spoken by the people of Punjab. Punjab was a province of British India until 1947. In that year, the province was split between the Asian countries of India and Pakistan. The majority of the former Punjab is now located in Pakistan, as the eastern province of Punjab. The rest of the land makes up the northwestern Indian state of Punjab. According to the 2011 Indian Census, just over 33 million speakers of Punjabi lived in India. It was the 11th most popular language in the country at that time, with 2. 7 percent of the country speaking it. According to the CIA Factbook, Punjabis are the largest ethnic group in Pakistan, making up 44. 7 percent of the population, and the Punjabi language is spoken by 48 percent of the country.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of Punjabi
First recorded in 1780–90; Punjab + -ī a suffix indicating relationship or origin
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Others told BBC Punjabi of seeing masked or unfamiliar people inside the university.
From BBC ● Sep. 29, 2026
Recordings, paintings, manuscripts and more reveal how songs in Persian, Urdu, Classical Hindi and Punjabi spread throughout the Mughal Empire and across the network of the East India Company from the 16th century onward.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 6, 2026
Syal was born in Wolverhampton in 1961 to Indian Punjabi parents, who had moved to the UK from New Delhi.
From BBC ● Sep. 4, 2026
Deadly accidents in Florida and San Bernardino County last year brought scrutiny to Sikh Punjabi truck drivers, who make up an estimated 20% of the U.S. trucking workforce.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 31, 2026
“He’s something of a genius. He has a Punjabi mother and a Bengali father, and because he learns French and English at school he already speaks four languages. I think he skipped two grades.”
From "Interpreter of Maladies" by Jhumpa Lahiri
He said he is hearing Punjabis are now targeted for impromptu English proficiency tests at highway checkpoints and weigh stations.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 12, 2025
For Punjabis - who are largely a farming community - it was an aspirational uprising, symbolic of how success and prosperity should look.
From BBC ● May 31, 2025
In Bakersfield, California, she meets a community of Punjabis who have opened a roadside truck stop, and others who are almond farmers and processors.
From Seattle Times ● May 16, 2023
The army’s ranks were dominated by ethnic Punjabis and Pashtuns, leaving Gen. Musharraf an outsider even among top officers.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 5, 2023
The senior Native officer with the Punjabis was Bakshi Ganda Sing, Commander-in-Chief of the Patiala army, a particularly handsome, gentlemanly Sikh, with whom I have ever since been on terms of friendly intercourse.
From Forty-one years in India From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief by Frederick Sleigh Roberts
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
