The people of Sri Lanka are the island’s greatest pleasure. For all the beauty of its beaches, temples and hills, travellers come home talking above all about the warmth of those they met, the ready smiles, the unforced generosity, the cup of tea pressed on a stranger. Some 22 million people share this small island, and they form one of Asia’s richest human mosaics: several communities, two official languages, four great religions and a history that is both proudly shared and, at times, painfully divided.
A mosaic of communities
Sri Lanka’s population is woven from several communities, most of whom have lived side by side on the island for many centuries.
The Sinhalese are the largest group, making up roughly three-quarters of the population. They speak Sinhala, are overwhelmingly Theravada Buddhist, and trace their story on the island back more than two thousand years to the ancient kingdoms of the north-central plains. Today they are concentrated in the populous, fertile south and west and across the central hills, and their culture, the great ancient kingdoms of Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa, the sacred city of Kandy, sits at the heart of the national story.
The Sri Lankan Tamils are the largest minority, at around twelve per cent. Predominantly Hindu and Tamil-speaking, they have a long history on the island, concentrated in the northern Jaffna peninsula and along the eastern coast. Distinct from them are the Indian Tamils, sometimes called Estate or Hill Country Tamils, descendants of labourers brought from South India by the British in the nineteenth century to work the tea and coffee plantations of the highlands. They remain largely in the hill country around Nuwara Eliya and Hatton, and their history is one of the harder chapters of the colonial era.
The Sri Lankan Moors make up about ten per cent of the population. Muslims of mixed Arab-trader and local descent, they speak mainly Tamil, follow Sunni Islam, and have deep roots in the island’s commercial life and along its coasts, especially in the east and in old trading towns like Galle. Alongside them are the Malays, descendants of soldiers and exiles brought under Dutch rule from South-East Asia, who add their own language and cuisine to the mix.
Two smaller communities carry an outsized weight in the island’s story. The Burghers are descendants of European colonists, Portuguese, Dutch and British, who married into local families over four centuries; traditionally English-speaking and often Christian, they gave Sri Lanka many of its lawyers, doctors, railwaymen and musicians. And the Veddas (Wanniyala-Aetto) are the island’s indigenous people, descended from its earliest inhabitants long before the Sinhalese or Tamils arrived. Once forest hunter-gatherers, only a small number keep their traditional way of life today, mostly in the eastern interior around Dambana, but they are honoured as the original people of the land.
Two languages, three scripts
Sri Lanka has two official languages, and they could hardly be more different. Sinhala, spoken by the majority, is an Indo-Aryan language distantly related to Hindi and written in a beautiful, rounded script said to have evolved that way to avoid splitting palm-leaf pages. Tamil, spoken by the Tamil communities and much of the Muslim population, is a Dravidian language, one of the world’s oldest living classical tongues, with its own angular script and no relation to Sinhala at all.
For much of the twentieth century, language was at the centre of the island’s politics, and the balance between Sinhala and Tamil remains a sensitive matter. Today both are official, and English, a legacy of British rule, serves as a widely understood link language between the two, dominant in business, higher education, tourism and the professional life of Colombo. Most people you meet in tourist areas will speak at least some English, and a few words of Sinhala or Tamil, ayubowan and vanakkam for hello, are always warmly received. You can read more on our page about the languages of Sri Lanka.
An island of faith
Few countries wear their religion so openly. Sri Lanka is a genuinely multi-faith society, and its four great religions shape the landscape, the calendar and daily life. Roughly seventy per cent of people are Buddhist, mostly Theravada Buddhists among the Sinhalese; the island has been a stronghold of the faith since the arrival of Buddhism in the third century BC, and cares for relics, above all the Sacred Tooth in Kandy, of world importance. About thirteen per cent are Hindu, chiefly among the Tamils, their colourful temples (kovils) alive with festivals in the north and east and the hill country.
Around ten per cent of Sri Lankans are Muslim, and close to eight per cent are Christian, mostly Roman Catholic, a legacy of Portuguese missionaries, and found across both major ethnic groups, especially along the west coast. It is common to see a Buddhist temple, a Hindu kovil, a mosque and a church within a few streets of one another, and many Sri Lankans will visit shrines of more than one faith. Adam’s Peak, the sacred mountain, is revered by Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Christians alike. Our guide to the religions of Sri Lanka explores this further.
The rhythm of daily life
Life for most Sri Lankans revolves around family, faith and food. Extended families often live close together, elders are deeply respected, and hospitality is close to sacred: the guest is treated as an honoured one, offered the best a household can provide, and never allowed to leave hungry or without a cup of tea. That ethic, old, genuine and utterly unforced, is what most visitors remember longest.
The daily table is rice and curry: not a single dish but a spread of small curries, sambols and vegetables around a mound of rice, mild to fiery, eaten by hand. Breakfast might be hoppers, string hoppers or a herbal green porridge; the day is punctuated by sweet, milky tea. Full-moon poya days are public holidays devoted to Buddhist observance, when many dress in white and the alcohol shops close, and the shared Sinhala and Tamil New Year in April is the warmest festival of the year, celebrated across communities with sweets, rituals and village games. And binding almost everyone together is cricket, the national passion, played on every spare scrap of ground and followed with an intensity that unites the whole island. Our page on Sri Lankan food has more on what appears at the table.
The soul of Sri Lanka
Beyond the statistics, a handful of everyday things capture the spirit of the island and its people, the rituals, gestures and pleasures you will meet again and again on a trip.
- 1
The head wobble
That sideways tilt of the head, somewhere between a nod and a shake, means 'yes', 'I understand' or simply 'all is well', the most Sri Lankan of gestures.
- 2
A cup of tea
Milky, sweet and strong, offered the moment you sit down. To share tea is to be welcomed, and refusing is almost impossible.
- 3
Rice and curry
Not one dish but a whole spread of small curries around a mound of rice, eaten with the right hand, the daily table of every household.
- 4
Temple and dagoba
White stupas, saffron-robed monks and the scent of frangipani and incense, Buddhism woven into the rhythm of ordinary days.
- 5
The poya holiday
Every full moon is a public holiday, when the devout visit temples in white and alcohol shops close, the lunar pulse of the calendar.
- 6
Cricket in the street
The nation's shared passion, played with a tape ball on any spare patch of ground and followed with fierce devotion.
- 7
Guest as honoured one
An age-old ethic of hospitality: a visitor is treated with generosity far beyond what a family can easily spare.
- 8
The tuk-tuk
The three-wheeler that carries the country, cheap, everywhere, and often decorated with a slogan, a deity or a football crest.
- 9
Kola kenda and hoppers
A green herbal porridge at dawn, bowl-shaped hoppers with a soft egg, the small breakfast rituals that start the day.
- 10
The New Year games
In April, Sinhala and Tamil families mark the harvest new year together with sweets, rituals and village games, the warmest date on the calendar.
A history handled with care
It would be dishonest to describe the Sri Lankan people without acknowledging the hardest chapter of their recent past. From 1983 to 2009, a long and painful civil war was fought between the government and Tamil separatists seeking an independent state in the north and east. It cost tens of thousands of lives, displaced many more, and left wounds that are still healing. Anyone travelling in the north, in particular, will sense that history close to the surface.
Yet the country today is at peace, and travel throughout the island, north, east, south and centre, is once again straightforward and welcoming. Most Sri Lankans, of every community, are keen to look forward, and the process of reconciliation continues. As a visitor, the wisest course is simple: come with curiosity and respect, listen more than you pronounce, and treat the island’s communities and their history with the sensitivity they deserve. You will be met, almost without exception, with extraordinary kindness.
The Sri Lankan diaspora
Sri Lanka’s story is not confined to the island. An estimated three million people of Sri Lankan origin live abroad, a diaspora built partly by the professionals and Burghers who left around independence, partly by Tamils who fled the war years, and partly by the vast numbers of Sri Lankans, of every community, who work overseas today. Large communities have taken root in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and across the Gulf states, where remittances sent home are a mainstay of the national economy.
That diaspora has carried Sri Lankan food, faith and cricket around the world, and keeps strong ties to the island, returning for weddings, temple festivals and the New Year, and investing in the country’s future. Wherever they have settled, the same qualities travel with them: hard work, close family, and the warm, generous hospitality that defines the people of Sri Lanka.
To plan the practical side of a visit, see our guides to the best time to visit and getting around Sri Lanka.