page_title: Demographics of Algeria
section_title: Ethnic groups
hierarchical_section_title: Demographics of Algeria / Ethnic groups
caption_attribution_description: English: Algerians in traditional costumes Français&#160;: Algériennes en costumes traditionnels
context_page_description: Ninety-one percent of the Algerian population lives along the Mediterranean coast on 12% of the country's total land mass. Forty-five percent of the population is urban, and urbanization continues, despite government efforts to discourage migration to the cities. Currently, 24,182,736 Algerians live in urban areas, and about 1.5 millions nomads live in the Saharan area.
  96% of the population follows Sunni Islam; the few non-Sunni Muslims are mainly Ibadis from the Mozabite valley at 1.3% and Shia Muslims.
  Christianity in Algeria constitutes about 1% of the total population. While significantly greater during the French colonial years, a mostly foreign Roman Catholic community still exists, as do some Protestants. The Jewish community of Algeria, which once constituted 2% of the total population, has substantially decreased due to emigration, mostly to France and Israel.
  Algeria's educational system has grown rapidly since 1962; in the last 12 years, attendance has doubled to more than 5 million students. Education is free and compulsory to age 16.
context_section_description: Algerians are descendants from the Berbers, who are the indigenous ethnic group of Algeria and are believed to be the ancestral stock on which elements from the Phoenicians, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Turks as well as other ethnic groups have contributed to the ethnic makeup of Algeria. Descendants of Andalusian refugees are also present in the population of Algiers and other cities. Moreover, Spanish was spoken by these Aragonese and Castillian Morisco descendants deep into the 18th century, and even Catalan was spoken at the same time by Catalan Morisco descendants in the small town of Grish El-Oued.
  The majority of Algerians identifies with an Arabic-based identity due to the 20th century Arab nationalism. The ethnic Berbers are divided into many groups with varying languages. The largest of these are the Kabyles, who live in the Kabylie region east of Algiers, the Chaoui of North-East Algeria, the Tuaregs in the southern desert and the Shenwa people of North Algeria.
  During the colonial period, there was a large (10% in 1960) European population who became known as Pied-Noirs. They were primarily of French, Spanish and Italian origin. Almost all of this population left during the war of independence or immediately after its end.
caption: Algerian women in traditional clothes
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