UNESCO reported in 2012 that out of a total ethnic population of 115, only 12 elderly native speakers remained, the rest of their small village on the west bank of the Weito River having adopted the Tsamai language instead.
Oral history of the Ongota tells that they originated from a number of different populations from Dikinte, Maale and Arbore among others.
)[full citation needed] Nilo-Saharan, and Cushiticist Maarten Mous[3][4] mentions it as a language isolate.
Dimmendaal (2011; 2020) considers Ongota a linguistic isolate that underwent heavy influence from neighboring languages,[5][6] a position that is also shared by Güldemann (2018).
In a brief expedition in the early 1990s, a number of researchers made the observation that many Ongota men married Tsamakko women.