The Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities describes Bairisch as a family of German dialects. Glottolog catalogues Bavarian as a spoken language and lists the ISO 639-3 code bar. These are two ways of classifying the same group of speech varieties. In Munich, the local dialect belongs to the Central Bavarian group. Bavarian Academy dialect map · Glottolog catalogue entry · Bavarian dialect education portal
Updated
What is the difference between Bairisch and Bayerisch?
In linguistic writing, Bairisch names the dialect group. Bayerisch refers to Bavaria and things associated with the state. That matters because Bavaria also has Franconian and Swabian dialects, and the Bairisch-speaking area extends into Austria and South Tyrol. Bavarian Academy · Austrian Academy dialect dictionary
Which Bavarian dialect is spoken in Munich?
The three broad groups are Northern Bavarian, Central Bavarian and Southern Bavarian. Northern Bavarian includes much of the Upper Palatinate. Central Bavarian extends across much of Upper and Lower Bavaria and into Austria. Munich is in that group. Southern Bavarian includes many varieties in Tyrol and South Tyrol. The groups describe areas with related speech, and the sounds and words vary from place to place. Bavarian dialect education portal
Do you need to learn Bavarian to visit Munich?
Standard German works for ordinary exchanges. You might also hear local words and sounds, depending on who’s speaking and where you are. The state’s speaking atlas has recordings from different places if you want to hear how the varieties differ. Munich phonetics research · Speaking dialect atlas
As we put it in our original guide, “we’ve had this discussion many times ourselves.” For something you can try at a Munich counter or beer-garden table, start with Fred’s Bavarian phrases.