Dai people

This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. The specific problem is: Non-Chinese usage should be moved to Tai peoples and. Please help improve this article if you can. (February 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Dai people
中国境内傣族

1962 photograph of a Dai girl weaving silk in Dehong Prefecture, Yunnan
Total population
c. 8 million
Regions with significant populations
Myanmar	6,345,236
Vietnam	1,818,350
China	1,159,000[1]
Laos	126,250
Thailand	145,236
Languages
Tai Lue, Tai Nuea, Tai Dam, Mandarin Chinese, Vietnamese, Lao, Thai
Religion
Theravada Buddhism and Dai folk religion[2]

The Dai people (Burmese: ရှမ်းလူမျိုး; Tai Lü: ᨴᩱ/ᨴᩱ᩠ᨿ; Lao: ໄຕ; Thai: ไท; Shan: တႆး, [tai˥˩]; Tai Nuea: ᥖᥭᥰ, [tai˥]; Chinese: 傣族; pinyin: Dǎizú) are several Tai-speaking ethnic groups living in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture and the Dehong Dai and Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture of China's Yunnan Province. The Dai people form one of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognized by the People's Republic of China. By extension, the term can apply to groups in Laos, Vietnam, Thailand and Myanmar when Dai is used to mean specifically Tai Yai, Lue, Chinese Shan, Tai Dam, Tai Khao or even Tai in general. For other names, see the table below.