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The six Maku languages are related among themselves, forming what can be called the Maku linguistic family. As far as is known, this family is completely separate from the Tukano and Arawak families, excluding a few obvious loanwords.

Practically all the Maku speak their own native languages. Due to the proximity of the Tukano, the Maku of the Uaupés area (Bara, Hupdu and Yuhupdu) speak Tukano languages, giving rise to the multi-lingualism typical to the region. On the other hand, the Tukano have been a kind of barrier to acculturation for the Maku of the Uaupés, since they act as intermediaries in contact with Whites, so that only about 20% of these Maku peoples know how to speak Portuguese or Spanish. The Nukak, whose contact was very recent (1988), speak little Spanish or any other language not their own. As for the Duw and Nadub, with a long history of contact (18th century) and without the 'Tukano barrier' close by, the large majority express themselves well in Portuguese and Nheengatu (the lingua franca or Amazonian Tupi, spoken mostly by the riverside populations of the middle and lower Negro River, descendants of the Baré, who are increasingly proclaiming themselves Indian with the expansion of the indigenous movement in the region).

The Maku languages have been studied in varying degrees. Bara (Kakwa), Hupdu, Yuhupdu and Nadub were the object of preliminary studies made by SIL missionaries, as well as Duw, undertaken by ALEM missionaries. However, none of these studies resulted in material that could be used in the development of bilingual education, increasingly demanded by the Maku, in justifiable reaction to the hegemony of the Dahséa (Tukano) language in local schools funded by municipal government and run by Catholic Salesian missionaries.