It is the primary and predominant language of the entire province of Pangasinan and northern Tarlac, on the northern part of Luzon's central plains geographic region, most of whom belong to the Pangasinan ethnic group.

A few Aeta groups and most Sambal in Central Luzon's northern part also understand and even speak Pangasinan as well.

[5][6] Pangasinan is similar to other closely related Philippine languages, Malay in Malaysia (as Malaysian), Indonesia (as Indonesian), Brunei, and Singapore, Hawaiian in Hawaii and Malagasy in Madagascar.

[9] Pangasinan is spoken in other Pangasinan communities in the Philippines, mostly in the neighboring provinces of Benguet, La Union, Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Zambales, and Nueva Vizcaya, and has varying speakers in Metro Manila, Cagayan, Isabela, Bulacan, Bataan, Aurora, Quezon, Cavite, Laguna, Mindoro, Palawan and Mindanao especially in Soccsksargen, Davao Region, Caraga, Bukidnon and Misamis Oriental.

Austronesian speakers settled in Maritime Southeast Asia during prehistoric times, perhaps more than 5,000 years ago.

The indigenous speakers of Pangasinan are descendants of these settlers, who were probably part of a wave of prehistoric human migration that is widely believed to have originated from Southern China via Taiwan between 10 and 6 thousand years ago.

Written Pangasinan and oral literature in the language flourished during the Spanish and American period.

Felipe Quintos, a Pangasinan officer of the Katipunan, wrote Sipi Awaray: Gelew Diad Pilipinas (Revolución Filipina), a history of the Katipunan revolutionary struggle in Pangasinan and surrounding provinces.

Narciso Corpus and Antonio Solis co-wrote Impanbilay na Manoc a Tortola, a short love story.

In April 2006, the creation of Pangasinan Wikipedia was proposed, which the Wikimedia Foundation approved for publication on the Internet.

Pangasinan has the following vowel phonemes:[8][1] In native vocabulary, /i/ and /u/ are realized as [i ~ ɪ ~ ɛ] and [u ~ ʊ ~ ɔ].

Glottal stop /ʔ/ sometimes occurs in coda in words ending in vowels, only before a pause.

Pangasinan literature, using the indigenous syllabary and the Latin alphabet, continued to flourish during the Spanish and American colonial period.

Most of the loan words in Pangasinan are Spanish, as the Philippines was ruled by Spain for more than 300 years.

Examples are lugar ('place'), podir (from poder, 'power, care'), kontra (from contra, 'against'), birdi (verde, 'green'), ispiritu (espíritu, 'spirit'), and santo ('holy, saint').

Lalo la no bilay No sikalay nanengneng Napunas ya ami'y Ermen ya akbibiten No nodnonoten ko ra'y samit na ogalim Agtaka nalingwanan Anggad kaayos na bilay Modern Pangasinan with English translation Malinak lay Labi Oras la’y mareen Mapalpalna’y dagem Katekep to’y linaew Samit da’y kugip ko Binangonan kon tampol Lapu’d say limgas mo Sikan sika’y amamayoen Lalo la bilay No sika la’y nanengne'ng Napunas lan amin So ermen ya akbibiten No nanonotan Ko la'y samit day ugalim Ag ta ka nalingwanan Angga’d kauyos na bilay A night of calm An hour of peace A gentle breeze Along with it is the dew So sweet is my dream Suddenly I awake Because of your beauty You are the only one I will love Best of all, my life When it's you that I see All are wiped away The sorrows that I bear When I remember Of your sweet kindness I will not forget you Until life is gone