Ingush (/ˈɪŋɡʊʃ/; Гӏалгӏай мотт, Ghalghaj mott, pronounced [ˈʁəlʁɑj mot]) is a Northeast Caucasian language spoken by about 500,000 people, known as the Ingush, across a region covering the Russian republics of Ingushetia and Chechnya.

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Ingush
гӏалгӏай мотт (Ghalghaj mott)
Pronunciation	[ˈʁəlʁɑj mot]
Native to	Russia
Region	Ingushetia, Chechnya
Ethnicity	Ingush
Native speakers	350,000 (2020)[1]
Language family	Northeast Caucasian Nakh Vainakh Chechen–Ingush Ingush
Writing system	Cyrillic (current) Georgian, Arabic, Latin (historical)
Official status
Official language in	Russia  Ingushetia
Language codes
ISO 639-2	inh
ISO 639-3	inh
Glottolog	ingu1240
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Ingush and Chechen, together with Bats, constitute the Nakh branch of the Northeast Caucasian language family. There is pervasive passive bilingualism between Ingush and Chechen.^[2]

Ingush is spoken by about 353,000 people (2020),^[1] primarily across a region in the Caucasus covering parts of Russia, primarily Ingushetia and Chechnya. Speakers can also be found in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Belgium, Norway, Turkey and Jordan.^{[citation needed]}

It is possible that during the period of 8–12th century, when the Temples like Tkhaba-Yerdy emerged in Ingushetia, a writing system based off a Georgian script emerged. This is attested by the fact that a non-Georgian name, 'Enola', was found written on the arc of Tkhaba-Yerdy.^[3] Furthermore, Georgian text was found on archaeological items in Ingushetia that could not be deciphered.^[4]

Ingush became a written language with an Arabic-based writing system at the beginning of the 20th century. After the October Revolution it first used a Latin alphabet, which was later replaced by Cyrillic.

Ingush is not divided into dialects with the exception of Galanchoz [ru] (native name: Галай-Чӏож/Галайн-Чӏаж), which is considered to be transitional between Chechen and Ingush.^[7]

Ingush is a nominative–accusative language in its syntax, though it has ergative morphology.^[8]