French-based creole languages
A French creole, or French-based creole language, is a creole for which French is the lexifier. Most often this lexifier is not modern French but rather a 17th- or 18th-century koiné of French from Paris, the French Atlantic harbors, and the nascent French colonies. This article also contains information on French pidgin languages, contact languages that lack native speakers.
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These contact languages are not to be confused with creolized varieties of French outside of Europe that date to colonial times, such as Acadian, Louisiana, New England or Quebec French.
There are over 15.5 million speakers of some form of French-based creole languages. Haitian Creole and Saint Lucian Creole are debatably the most spoken creole languages in the world, with over 12 million speakers.