The Ekpeye (Àkpà ọ́híá) are a people in southeastern Nigeria with a distinct culture and rulers of a former kingdom. The Ekpeye are usually included as a subgroup of the Igbo people on linguistic and cultural grounds. They speak an Igboid language. Ekpeye people live in the Ahoada (Ahuda) and Ogba-Egbema areas of Rivers State in Nigeria, and were a population of about 80,000 by the 1991 census, the number has increased by about 63% increasing them to approximately 130,000, according to the 2006 census estimates.