page_title: Yoruba people
section_title: The Yoruba diaspora
hierarchical_section_title: Yoruba people / Demographics / The Yoruba diaspora
context_page_description: The Yoruba people are an ethnic group that inhabits western Africa, mainly Nigeria, Benin, Togo and part of Ghana. The Yoruba constitute around 57–60 million people worldwide. The vast majority of this population is from Nigeria, where the Yoruba make up 21% of the country's population making them one of the largest ethnic groups in Africa. Most Yoruba people speak the Yoruba language, which is the Niger-Congo language with the largest number of native speakers.
  The Yoruba share borders with the very closely related Itsekiri to the south-east in the North West Niger delta, Bariba to the north in Benin and Nigeria, the Nupe also to the north and the Ebira to the northeast in central Nigeria. To the east are the Edo, Ẹsan and the Afemai groups in mid-western Nigeria. Adjacent to the Ebira and Edo groups are the related Igala people found in the northeast, on the left bank of the Niger River. To the southwest are the Gbe speaking Mahi, Gun, Fon and Ewe who border Yoruba communities in Benin and Togo. Significant Yoruba populations in other West African countries can be found in Ghana, Benin, Ivory Coast, and Sierra Leone.
context_section_description: Yoruba people or descendants can be found all over the world especially in the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States, Cuba, Brazil, Latin America, and the Caribbean. Significant Yoruba communities can be found in South America and Australia. The migration of Yoruba people all over the world has led to a spread of the Yoruba culture across the globe. Yoruba people have historically been spread around the globe by the combined forces of the Atlantic slave trade and voluntary self migration. Their exact population outside Africa is unknown, but researchers have established that the majority of the African component in the ancestry of African Americans is of Yoruba and/or Yoruba-like extraction. In their Atlantic world domains, the Yorubas were known by the designations: "Nagos/Anago", "Terranova", "Lucumi" and "Aku", or by the names of their various clans.
  The Yoruba left an important presence in Cuba and Brazil, particularly in Havana and Bahia. According to a 19th-century report, "the Yoruba are, still today, the most numerous and influential in this state of Bahia. The most numerous are those from Oyo, capital of the Yoruba kingdom". Others included Ijexa (Ijesha), Lucumi Ota (Aworis), Ketus, Ekitis, Jebus (Ijebu), Egba, Lucumi Ecumacho (Ogbomosho), and Anagos. In the documents dating from 1816 to 1850, Yorubas constituted 69.1% of all slaves whose ethnic origins were known, constituting 82.3% of all slaves from the Bight of Benin. The proportion of slaves from West-Central Africa (Angola – Congo) dropped drastically to just 14.7%.
  Between 1831 and 1852 the African-born slave and free population of Salvador, Bahia surpassed that of free Brazil born Creoles. Meanwhile, between 1808 and 1842 an average of 31.3% of African-born freed persons had been Nagos (Yoruba). Between 1851 and 1884, the number had risen to a dramatic 73.9%.
  Other areas that received a significant number of Yoruba people and are sites of Yoruba influence are: Puerto Rico, Saint Lucia, Grenada, Santa Margarita and Belize, British Guyana, Saint-Domingue (Now Haiti), Jamaica(Where they settled and established such places as Abeokuta, Naggo head in Portmore, and by their hundreds in other parishes like Hanover and Westmoreland, both in western Jamaica- leaving behind practices such as Ettu from Etutu, the Yoruba ceremony of atonement among other customs of people bearing the same name, and certain aspects of Kumina such as Sango veneration), Barbados, Dominican republic, Montserrat, etc.
  On 31 July 2020, the Yoruba World Congress joined the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO).
caption: Distribution of Kru, Ibo and Yoruba speakers in the United States, US Census 2000[133]