Since the 1980s, Innu-aimun has had considerable exposure in the popular culture of Canada and France due to the success of the rock music band Kashtin and the later solo careers of its founders Claude McKenzie and Florent Vollant.

Widely heard hit songs with Innu-language lyrics have included "Ish-kuess" ("Girl"), "E Uassiuian" ("My Childhood"), "Tipatshimun" ("Story") and in particular "Akua tuta" ("Take care of yourself"), which appeared on soundtrack compilations for the television series Due South and the documentary Music for The Native Americans.

The lyrics of Akua Tuta are featured on over 50 websites, making this one of the most broadly accessible pieces of text written in any native North American language.

"[5] Innu-aimun has the following phonemes (with the standard orthography equivalents in angle brackets, this section discusses the Sheshatshit dialect):[6] The plosives are voiced to [b d dʒ ɡ ɡʷ] between vowels.

Innu-aimun is related to East Cree (Īyiyū Ayimūn – Northern/Coastal dialect and Īnū Ayimūn – Southern/Inland dialect) spoken by the James Bay Cree of the James Bay region of Quebec and Ontario and the Atikamekw (Nēhinawēwin and Nehirâmowin) of the Atikamekw (Nehiraw, Nehirowisiw) in the upper Saint-Maurice River valley of Quebec.