Animalese is the default spoken language of villagers and other characters in the Animal Crossing series. Each letter spoken is stated to synthesize the basic sound of a letter, leading to mispronounciation of some words. (i.e. "Animal Crossing" would be pronounced "Ah-n-ih-m-ah-l c-r-o-s-s-ih-n-g".) When villagers say numbers, they will talk rather clearly, like when the player is typing a letter. The name of the player and the name of the town can be clearly discerned as well, although they may also be mispronounced depending on the way each letter of the word is said in Animalese. Laughing and similar sounds are also discernible. However, much of Animalese is completely unintelligible.

Different personalities (such as cranky or snooty), animals with jobs in the town (ex. Pelly, Tom Nook) and 1-day visitors to the town (Gracie, Wendell, etc.) will have different pitches to Animalese. Cranky villagers have a lower, rougher pitch than a villager with a normal or peppy personality. Different characters will have higher or lower voices. If the text is sped up, the Animalese also speeds up, sounding more highpitched. Happy, sad, or angry villagers will have a different pitch to Animalese. The sound of Animalese differs slightly in each game.

It is interesting to note that K.K. Slider will always sing in Animalese, even if one of the two alternate languages has been chosen in the options.

In Japanese, Animalese is more clear and easy to understand as Japanese kana characters each represent one syllable from Japanese speech. For each symbol, the corresponding syllable sound is played, whereas in English Animalese consists of spellings of each letter as each letter can be pronounced differently in the English language.

Bebebese or Silence could once be spoken as an alternate language in the options, but both were removed in Animal Crossing: New Leaf. Interestingly, in the English language version of New Leaf, the player's keyboard is spoken in Animalese rather than clear English.