Finnish, a Uralic language, is spoken by about 5.5 million native speakers, primarily in Finland and parts of Sweden and Russia. It uses the Latin alphabet with additional characters like "ä" and "ö." Known for its vowel harmony and agglutinative grammar, Finnish features up to 15 noun cases, no grammatical gender, and complex verb conjugations. Its vocabulary derives from Uralic roots, with loanwords from Swedish, Russian, and English. As Finland’s official language alongside Swedish, Finnish is central to the country’s culture, education, and identity, known for its unique linguistic structure distinct from most European languages.