Despite originating from a non-tonal language family, Hausa utilizes differences in pitch to distinguish words and grammar.

States (or cities) in which Hausa is spoken predominantly include Kano, Kaduna, Katsina, Daura, Gobir, Zaria, Sokoto, Birnin Kebbi, Gusau, Dutse, Hadejia, Bauchi, Misau, Zamfara, Gombe, Nafada, Maiduguri, Yobe, Yola, Jalingo, Jos, Lafia, Nasarawa, Minna, Kontagora, Keffi and Abuja.

[11] It is very popular in the cities of Maradi, Diffa, Tahoua, Zinder, Tillaberi, Dosso, and Agadez.

In Cameroon, Hausa is spoken in the north, including the cities of Ngaoundere, Garoua, and Maroua.

[16] Eastern Hausa dialects include Dauranci in Daura, Kananci in Kano, Bausanci in Bauchi, Gudduranci in Katagum Misau and part of Borno, and Hadejanci in Hadejiya.

[17] Western Hausa dialects include Sakkwatanci in Sokoto, Katsinanci in Katsina, Arewanci in Gobir, Adar, Kebbi, and Zanhwaranci in Zamfara, and Kurhwayanci in Kurfey in Niger.

The BBC, Deutsche Welle, Radio France Internationale and Voice of America offer Hausa services on their international news web sites using Dauranci and Kananci.

[21] While mutually comprehensible with other dialects (especially Sakkwatanci, and to a lesser extent Gaananci), the northernmost dialects have slight grammatical and lexical differences owing to frequent contact with the Zarma, Fula, and Tuareg groups and cultural changes owing to the geographical differences between the grassland and desert zones.

Gaananci forms a separate group from other Western Hausa dialects, as it now falls outside the contiguous Hausa-dominant area, and is usually identified by the use of c for ky, and j for gy.

This is attributed to the fact that Ghana's Hausa population descend from Hausa-Fulani traders settled in the zongo districts of major trade-towns up and down the previous Asante, Gonja and Dagomba kingdoms stretching from the sahel to coastal regions, in particular the cities of Accra (Sabon Zango, Nima), Takoradi and Cape Coast Gaananci exhibits noted inflected influences from Zarma, Gur, Jula-Bambara, Akan, and Soninke, as Ghana is the westernmost area in which the Hausa language is a major lingua-franca among sahelian/Muslim West Africans, including both Ghanaian and non-Ghanaian zango migrants primarily from the northern regions, or Mali and Burkina Faso.

Ghana also marks the westernmost boundary in which the Hausa people inhabit in any considerable number.

Immediately west and north of Ghana (in Côte d'Ivoire, and Burkina Faso), Hausa is abruptly replaced with Dioula–Bambara as the main sahelian/Muslim lingua-franca of what become predominantly Manding areas, and native Hausa-speakers plummet to a very small urban minority.

Because of this, and the presence of surrounding Akan, Gbe, Gur and Mande languages, Gaananci was historically isolated from the other Hausa dialects.

Hausa is also spoken in various parts of Cameroon and Chad, which combined the mixed dialects of Northern Nigeria and Niger.

In West Africa, Hausa's use as a lingua franca has given rise to a non-native pronunciation that differs vastly from native pronunciation by way of key omissions of implosive and ejective consonants present in native Hausa dialects, such as ɗ, ɓ and kʼ/ƙ, which are pronounced by non-native speakers as d, b and k respectively.

Gibanawa is currently in widespread use in Jega in northwestern Nigeria, south of the native Hausa area.

[29][30] Hausa has glottalic consonants (implosives and ejectives) at four or five places of articulation (depending on the dialect).

[34] The short /a/ can be either similar in quality to the long /aː/, or it can be as high as [ə], with possible intermediate pronunciations ([ɐ ~ ɜ]).

Except for the Zaria and Bauchi dialects spoken south of Kano, Hausa distinguishes between masculine and feminine genders.

[38] Hausa's modern official orthography is a Latin-based alphabet called boko, which was introduced in the 1930s by the British colonial administration.

The first known work to be written in Hausa is Riwayar Nabi Musa by Abdullahi Suka in the 17th century.

[40] As Hausa Ajami script was never recognized and regulated officially, there has never been a top down imposition of a unified convention.

Beige highlight marks letters that are only used for writing of loan words of Arabic or European origin.

Green highlight marks letters that are innovations of Hausa orthography and are not used in Arabic language.