Minnan dialect originated in Quanzhou. Mainly distributed in southern Fujian and Taiwan Province Province, it is also widely used in most Chinese communities in northeastern Fujian, southeastern Zhejiang, Chaoshan and Hailufeng areas in Guangdong, Leizhou Peninsula in Guangdong, Hainan Island and Southeast Asia.
The word Minnan has broad and narrow meanings. In a broad sense, it refers to the collection of Minnan language families, and in a narrow sense, it only refers to the Minnan languages of Fujian and Taiwan Province. Scholars in Taiwan Province Province and the West believe that it is a language and belongs to the Chinese language family. In the classification of continental linguistics, it belongs to a kind of Min language in Chinese language family.