Various regional languages and dialects such as Pinghua, Zhuang, Kam, Cantonese, Hakka, and Min are spoken alongside Mandarin Chinese.

[citation needed] The official name was also known as Kwangsi Chuang Autonomous Region in a number of Western publications outside of China published in the 1950s to 1970s.

[8] Originally inhabited by a mixture of tribal groups known to the Chinese as the Baiyue ("Hundred Yue", Vietnamese: Bách Việt), the region first became part of China during the Qin dynasty.

In 214 BC, the Han Chinese general Zhao Tuo (Vietnamese: Triệu Đà) claimed most of southern China for Qin Shi Huang before the emperor's death.

[9] The name "Guangxi" can be traced to the "Expansive" or "Wide" province (廣州) of the Eastern Wu, which controlled southeastern China during the Three Kingdoms period.

[citation needed] Under the Tang dynasty, the Zhuang moved to support Piluoge's kingdom of Nanzhao in Yunnan, which successfully repulsed imperial armies in 751 and 754.

[citation needed] The Yuan dynasty established control over Yunnan during its conquest of the Dali Kingdom in 1253 and eliminated the Southern Song following the Battle of Yamen in 1279.

Rather than ruling Lingnan as a subject territory or military district, the Mongolians then established Guangxi ("Western Expanse") as a proper province.

Although Louis Brière de l'Isle was unable to invade its depot at Longzhou, the Guangxi Army saw a great deal of action in the 1884 Sino-French War.

The Qing governor, Shen Bingdan, initially remained in place but was subsequently removed by a mutiny commanded by General Lu Rongting.

General Lu's Old Guangxi clique overran Hunan and Guangdong as well and helped lead the National Protection War against Yuan Shikai's attempt to re-establish an imperial government.

After the death of Sun Yat-sen, Li also repulsed Tang Jiyao's revolt and joined the Northern Expedition establishing control over other warlords by the Republic of China.

Within the People's Republic of China, Guangxi is also noted for the Baise Uprising, a failed CCP revolt led by Chen Zhaoli and Deng Xiaoping in 1929.

[citation needed] In 1952, a small section of Guangdong's coastline (Qinzhou, Lianzhou (now Hepu County), Fangchenggang and Beihai) was given to Guangxi, giving it access to the sea.

[17]: 101  Militia members from Guangxi performed tasks including building roads, bridges, trenches, other logistical efforts, and caring for the wounded.

[17]: 101 Located in the southern part of the country, Guangxi is bordered by Yunnan to the west, Guizhou to the north, Hunan to the northeast, and Guangdong to the east and southeast.

[19] Karst landforms,[20] characterized by steep mountains and large caverns,[18] are common in Guangxi, accounting for 37.8 percent of its total land area.

[19] The autonomous region also has sizable populations of indigenous Yao, Miao, Kam, Mulam, Maonan, Hui, Bouyei, Gin, Yi, Sui and Gelao peoples.

[42] The reports did not give figures for other types of religion; 59.26% of the population may be either irreligious or involved in worship of nature deities, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, folk religious sects.

It focuses on the development of hardware mechanical and electrical products, daily-use chemical processing, services, and the international logistics-based storage and information industry.

Cooperation between Guangxi and Taiwan companies mainly relates to manufacturing, high-tech electronic industries, agriculture, energy resources, and tourism.

[citation needed] Due to a lack of investment in construction in the power grid net in rural areas, more than 400 villages in Guangxi Province were not included in the projects.

[citation needed] In late February 2008, the central government approved China's first international and regional economic cooperation zone in Guangxi.

The state will adopt policies and measures to support mechanism innovation, rational industry layout, and infrastructure construction in the Beibu Gulf Economic Zone.

But the shortage of talent and professionals in petrochemicals, iron and steel, electricity, finance, tourism, port planning, logistics and marine industries are bottlenecks.

[citation needed] The regional government is also working on speeding up key cooperation projects including transportation, the marine industry, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, energy development, cross-border tourism, and environmental protection.

The ministry said that the new reserves, which are located in Chongzhou in the southern region of Youjiang, have very high-quality bauxite, a raw material for making aluminum.

In the capital of Nanning, for example, three varieties of Chinese are spoken locally: Southwestern Mandarin, Yue (specifically Cantonese), and Pinghua, in addition to various Zhuang languages and others.

[citation needed] Guangxi cuisine is known as Chinese: 桂菜; pinyin: guìcài however it is not as affluent as its more known neighbours like Sichuan, Hunan or Guangdong.

Smaller populations of Guangfu (720 thousand) and Qinlian (3.9 million) speakers can also be found, primarily distributed along the Pearl River and the southern coast of the province respectively.