Turkish is a member of the Turkic language family, including Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and Tatar. These languages share many standard features, but Turkish is not closely related to any other language outside the Turkic family. Turkish is closely related to Gagauz and Azerbaijani within the Turkic language family.

Turkish has also been heavily influenced by other languages, particularly Persian, Arabic, and French. As a result, it has borrowed many words and phrases from these languages, further contributing to its unique character and structure.