It is a dialect of Chaoshan Min language.

[4] It is similar to and largely mutually intelligible with the Teochew dialect.

Shantou dialect has 18 initials, 61 rimes and 8 tones.

Shantou dialect has extremely extensive tone sandhi rules: in an utterance, only the last syllable pronounced is not affected by the rules.

The two-syllable tonal sandhi rules are shown in the table below: