# SDL_GetPreferredLocales

Report the user's preferred locale.

## Header File

Defined in [SDL_locale.h](https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL/blob/SDL2/include/SDL_locale.h)

## Syntax

```c
SDL_Locale * SDL_GetPreferredLocales(void);
```

## Return Value

([SDL_Locale](SDL_Locale) *) Return array of locales, terminated with a
locale with a NULL language field. Will return NULL on error.

## Remarks

This returns an array of [SDL_Locale](SDL_Locale) structs, the final item
zeroed out. When the caller is done with this array, it should call
[SDL_free](SDL_free)() on the returned value; all the memory involved is
allocated in a single block, so a single [SDL_free](SDL_free)() will
suffice.

Returned language strings are in the format xx, where 'xx' is an ISO-639
language specifier (such as "en" for English, "de" for German, etc).
Country strings are in the format YY, where "YY" is an ISO-3166 country
code (such as "US" for the United States, "CA" for Canada, etc). Country
might be NULL if there's no specific guidance on them (so you might get {
"en", "US" } for American English, but { "en", NULL } means "English
language, generically"). Language strings are never NULL, except to
terminate the array.

Please note that not all of these strings are 2 characters; some are three
or more.

The returned list of locales are in the order of the user's preference. For
example, a German citizen that is fluent in US English and knows enough
Japanese to navigate around Tokyo might have a list like: { "de", "en_US",
"jp", NULL }. Someone from England might prefer British English (where
"color" is spelled "colour", etc), but will settle for anything like it: {
"en_GB", "en", NULL }.

This function returns NULL on error, including when the platform does not
supply this information at all.

This might be a "slow" call that has to query the operating system. It's
best to ask for this once and save the results. However, this list can
change, usually because the user has changed a system preference outside of
your program; SDL will send an [SDL_LOCALECHANGED](SDL_LOCALECHANGED) event
in this case, if possible, and you can call this function again to get an
updated copy of preferred locales.

## Version

This function is available since SDL 2.0.14.

----
[CategoryAPI](CategoryAPI), [CategoryAPIFunction](CategoryAPIFunction), [CategoryLocale](CategoryLocale)

