[8][9][10][11] The decision to rename the local variety of Persian in 1964 was more political than linguistic to support an Afghan state narrative.

Apart from a few basics of vocabulary, there is little difference between formal written Persian of Afghanistan and Iran; the languages are mutually intelligible.

[20] Dari Persian served as the preferred literary and administrative language among non-native speakers, such as the Turco-Mongol peoples including the Mughals,[21] for centuries before the rise of modern nationalism.

In Afghanistan, Dari refers to a modern dialect form of Persian that is the standard language used in administration, government, radio, television, and print media.

The majority of scholars believe that Dari refers to the Persian word dar or darbār (دربار), meaning "court", as it was the formal language of the Sassanids.

[29][unreliable source][30] The first person in Europe to use the term Deri for Dari may have been Thomas Hyde in his chief work, Historia religionis veterum Persarum (1700).

Iqbal loved both styles of literature and poetry, when he wrote: گرچه هندی در عذوبت شکر است 1[34] Garče Hendī dar uzūbat šakkar ast طرز گفتار دری شیرین تر است tarz-e goftār-e Darī šīrīn tar astThis can be translated as: Even though in euphonious Hindi is sugar – Rhyme method in Dari is sweeter Uzūbat usually means "bliss", "delight", "sweetness"; in language, literature and poetry, uzubat also means "euphonious" or "melodic".

Referring to the 14th-century Persian poet Hafez, Iqbal wrote: شکرشکن شوند همه طوطیان هند Šakkar-šakan šavand hama tūtīyān-i Hind زین قند پارسی که به بنگاله می‌رود zīn qand-i Pārsī ki ba Bangāla mē-ravadEnglish translation: All the parrots of India will crack sugar Through this Persian Candy which is going to Bengal[35][36]Here qand-e Pārsī ("Rock candy of Persia") is a metaphor for the Persian language and poetry.

[37] Ferghana, Samarkand, and Bukhara were starting to be influenced by Dari, and were originally Khwarezmian and Sogdian-speaking areas during Samanid rule.

[38] Dari Persian spread around the Oxus River region, Afghanistan, and Khorasan after the Arab conquests and during Islamic-Arab rule.

[41] Dari Persian spread and led to the extinction of Eastern Iranian languages like Bactrian and Khwarezmian with only a tiny amount of Sogdian descended Yaghnobi speakers remaining, as the ancestors of Tajiks started speaking Dari after relinquishing their original language (most likely Bactrian) around this time, due to the fact that the Arab-Islamic army which invaded Central Asia also included some Persians who governed the region like the Sassanids.

Moreover, while Pashtuns (37–48%)[54][52][55] natively speak Pashto, those living in Tajik and Hazara dominated areas also use Dari Persian as their main or secondary language.

[56] Dari Persian dominates the northern, western, and central areas of Afghanistan, and is the common language spoken in cities such as Balkh, Mazar-i-Sharif, Herat, Fayzabad, Panjshir, Bamiyan, and the Afghan capital of Kabul where all ethnic groups are settled.

Dari Persian-speaking communities also exist in southwestern and eastern Pashtun-dominated areas such as in the cities of Ghazni, Farah, Zaranj, Lashkar Gah, Kandahar, and Gardez.

Persian lexemes and certain morphological elements (e.g., the ezāfe) have often been employed to coin words for political and cultural concepts, items, or ideas that were historically unknown outside the South Asian region, as is the case with the aforementioned "borrowings".

Dari Persian has a rich and colorful tradition of proverbs that deeply reflect Afghan culture and relationships, as demonstrated through the works of Rumi and other literature.

[3] Varieties in this group share many features with the dialects of Persian spoken in Eastern Iran, and one may make many comparisons between the speech of Herat and Mashhad.

Spoken by the Hazara people, these varieties are spoken in the majority of central Afghanistan including: Bamyan, parts of Ghazni, Daikundi, Laal Sari Jangal in Ghor province, 'uruzgan khas', in a wide area in the west of Kabul which is mainly recognized as Dashti Barchi, and some regions near Herat.

However Encyclopaedia Iranica considers the Sistani dialect to constitute their own distinctive group, with notable influences from Balochi.

However, speakers in Urban regions of Kabul, Panjšir and other nearby provinces in southern and eastern Afghanistan tend to realize the vowel as [ɪ].

The local name for the Persian variety spoken in Afghanistan was officially changed from Farsi to Dari, meaning "court language", in 1964.