If you are asked what language most people in the world speak, what would you say? Say - in English? And you will be wrong. English, of course, was and remains the most popular language for learning: it is studied in most language schools It is used by residents of many countries. We have already written about how to choose the best teacher English - in a word, it is really extremely relevant and desired language. But far from the only and not even the first in the ranking of the most popular languages peace.
Are you surprised? We are sure that English is the universal remedy communication - for example, In that case, yes. And also for business, study, many areas professional activity(for example, for lawyers, about English for which). But there are other reasons as well.
Most popular foreign languages
Let's make a reservation right away: these “foreign” languages are for us, we choose them for learning as needed. But for tens and hundreds of millions of people they are native languages. It is this sign - how many people consider a particular language as their native language - that is one of the main ones for determining the popularity of a language in the world. Let's compile the TOP 10 most spoken native languages on the planet in 2017:
Chinese 1320 million people
Hindi and Urdu 490 million people
Spanish 437 million people
English 372 million people
Arabic 295 million people
Bengali 242 million people
Portuguese 219 million people
Russian 154 million people
Japanese 128 million people
German and Korean and shared an honorable 10th place - they are considered relatives of 77 million people.
As you can see, although English is among the top five, it is far from the most common in the world according to the principle of “native language”. Like others European languages- Asian left them far behind. It can even be said that the above rating contains the most common spoken languages in the world. Their carriers may know and use several foreign languages, but everyone knows their native language.
Mother tongue is the language that a person speaks from childhood. First and learned naturally without special study. The language in which a person thinks. (Engide Help)
The most popular languages of different countries
The history of mankind regularly makes its own adjustments to life ordinary people, read - native speakers of a particular language. In addition, history has little regard for geography, due to which the same language can be the official state, colloquial and simply the most common in completely different territories that are far from each other.
The conquest of new territories and the colonial policy of Great Britain provided the English language with the first place in the ranking of official languages. different countries. We talked about them in detail. And today we list the most popular languages of the world, which are state. The rating looks like this:
Language |
In which countries is it considered official |
The total number of such countries |
English |
UK, USA, India, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa and other Commonwealth countries (the so-called English-speaking world, or “Anglosphere”) |
|
French |
France, Canada, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Monaco, Western and central Africa and others (the so-called francophone countries) |
|
Arab |
countries North Africa and the Middle East ( common name- Arab world) |
|
Spanish |
Spain, Equatorial Guinea and Ibero-America (except Brazil, more on that below) |
|
Portuguese |
Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Mozambique and other Commonwealth countries |
|
Deutsch |
Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Belgium, Luxembourg |
|
Russia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan |
||
Italian |
Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican |
|
Malay |
Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Singapore |
With this approach, the most popular languages have changed places, the hierarchy has changed. Please note that the list has Italian language, which was not among the most common on the basis of the native language. And we are happy about it - it is very beautiful and melodic!
Most Popular Languages to Learn
Study of foreign languages on courses in a group, alone with a teacher or on your own - a responsible and difficult task. It will take more than one year for a high-quality and in-depth study of an unfamiliar language from scratch before you can freely use it in colloquial speech and correspondence. Therefore, it is not surprising that most often students of language schools choose to study English - in most situations, it is he who is needed.
However, learning English as a foreign language is not at all necessary for many inhabitants of our planet. Everyone has their reasons. For example, a line of business, a planned emigration, or just a passion for a certain culture. For example, we can give several good reasons for learning English and / or other common foreign languages:
English language(English-speaking companies and processes) provides the largest share(approximately 29.3%) of the total world GDP. In second place in this respect - Chinese(more than 12.5%), and its share is constantly growing.
More than half of all existing websites use English. You may be surprised, but in second place in terms of the number of sites is Runet (about 6.7% of all sites use the Russian language).
Almost one and a half billion people use Chinese. And at the same time, it is considered the most difficult language in the world. Why not test your strength and learn Chinese? ;)
According to some linguists and sociologists, after some relatively short time, the Hindi language will overtake Chinese and take the place of the language with the most large quantity carriers in the world. Today, the number of its speakers reaches almost half a million people.
The French language, with its relatively modest number of speakers (“only” 150 million people), is official language such international organizations like the European Union, the International Olympic Committee and the United Nations.
In a word, each language is interesting in its own way and reflects the culture of the people who created it. Although only a few languages have the status of a world language. In total, linguists have about 7,000 languages on Earth. So there is something to learn, good luck and inspiration!
Approximate calculations showed that there are about 7 thousand languages in the world. global importance have only a few dozen of them. According to scientists, every year the number of languages is reduced, which greatly impoverishes world culture.
AT modern world many languages are lost, only the most common ones remain, which cannot but upset. Several common languages are recognized around the world, and their popularity depends on many factors: population, interactions in trade, diplomatic relations and learning, exchange cultural heritage. Territorial neighborhood plays an important role in the spread of languages. Linguistic Studies in 2017 showed that in the world there are 10 most popular languages spoken by a large number of the population of the earth.
10th place - French
The sonorous, melodic and truly romantic language, in which every word is saturated with feelings, is used in fifty-three countries of the world. It is spoken by just over 229 million people. The language is official in France, it is spoken in Belgium, Switzerland, Canada, Africa and many other cities. This language is gaining popularity after a long decline. And it is actively studied in many countries of the world from the school bench.
9th place - Portuguese
The spread of this language is associated with population growth, as well as with global cooperation. In 2017, about 230 million people were recorded using this language as their main language. Portuguese is spoken in Brazil and Portugal, Angola, Mozambique and other African countries.
8th place - Bengali
This language is spoken in Bangladesh and West Bengal. It is spoken by about 261.5 million people. In India, this language is considered the second most spoken language, and the annual population growth ensures the spread of this language.
7th place - Russian
The total number of those burning in Russian is about 268 million people. This language is considered one of the most popular on the Internet, second only to English. Thanks to such a wide distribution, the language is gaining admirers in many countries of the world, but is considered one of the most difficult. The many dialects make the language incredibly rich and it is one of the six languages used in the United Nations.
6th place - Malay
This language is divided into two dialects: Malaysian and Indonesian. The total number of people using this language is 281 million. Spreading Malay associated with foreign economics and politics, as well as the interest of countries.
5th place - Arabic
It is spoken by approximately 292 million people in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and other countries. The common language is one of the six international ones.
4th place - Spanish
About 436 million people speak this language, and it is official in 20 countries. It is gaining popularity among the population of the world, and all more people take up the study of emotional language, admiring its sonority and brightness.
3rd place - Hindustani
In India it is Hindi and in Pakistan it is Urdu. A language spoken by 544 million people, including Nepal and Bangladesh. According to scientists, this language may become the most common due to population growth, and will also be able to overtake Chinese.
2nd place - English
The total number of speakers of this language is 983 million people. It is spoken in 106 countries and is official in 59 of them. English is spoken not only by native speakers, but also by those who frequent English-speaking countries. The global study of this language makes it one of the most widespread.
1st place - Chinese
The Chinese language has a lot of dialects, but they are considered to be one language. It is spoken by more than a billion inhabitants of the planet, which makes it the most popular and recognizable. The most spoken language in the world depends on the population of China, Taiwan and Singapore. It is the most difficult, but is gaining popularity among both older people and teenagers who closely follow books and films in Chinese. Chinese is also studied by those who are interested in the culture of the Middle Kingdom, as well as residents of cities neighboring China, including Russians.
The most common languages are used not only for everyday communication. They are the link in the global economy and political cooperation. According to research, the world languages that are actually used in international communication include German, Spanish and Persian. These languages are less common due to the number of people who use them, but are popular. We are waiting for your comments, and do not forget to press the buttons and
To date, about 6,000 languages are known, but most of the world's population speaks approximately 150 languages. The rest is dead languages which practically no one speaks, which have been preserved in the form of letters and historical texts stored in libraries or artificially cultivated in a certain circle of people. The most interesting 45% of the world's population speaks the 10 most popular languages, the rest are gradually falling into disuse, becoming part of history. Meet the 10 most popular languages on earth.
10 Punjabi
Punjabi is the native language of nearly 110 million people living on the India-Pakistan border, and speakers of which can also be found in English speaking countries Europe and America.
9. Japanese
Japanese is probably the most "polite" language in the world, with 127 million native speakers. There are special speech patterns for courtesy to people depending on the status and position in society. Sometimes it seems that the Japanese speak absolutely different languages depending on who they turn to to older people and authorities or scolding a child running around the street. The Japanese language is incredibly difficult to learn due to the writing of words in hieroglyphs.
8. Russian
Russian is the most popular language among Slavic group, which is native to 160 million people. It is difficult for most people to study because of Cyrillic alphabet, genders, cases and endings.
7. Bengali
I think that before that you had heard a little about the Bengali language and, moreover, you had never seen the cunning ligature of letters. However, it is spoken by more than 205 million people in Bangladesh and a number of Indian provinces.
6. Portuguese
The great colonial past allowed the Portuguese language to become one of the most popular in the world, which is considered native to 215 million people. carriers Portuguese can be found in Europe South America and a number of African countries.
5. Arabic
Arab literary language considers itself native to 295 million people on earth, which is used in news releases and at official ceremonies. Most of the inhabitants of the Arab countries speak local dialects, and if they were counted separately, then the Arabic language would be far from the top ten most common languages in the world, but fortunately the leadership Arab countries goes to great lengths to ensure that differences in dialects different regions were minimal.
4. English
Surprisingly, in fourth place was English, which is considered their mother tongue by 360 million people. But English is the language of international communication, in which negotiations are conducted, businessmen communicate, plus it’s simply filmed great amount films and series.
3. Spanish
You will be joyfully greeted with the cry of "Hola" by 470 million people on earth who consider Spanish as their native language, and this is no less, almost 5.85% of the world's population, mainly living in South America. By the way, for many Americans, Spanish is a second language. Moreover, every year the number of people who speak Spanish only increases, which is very easy to learn.
2. Hindi
There are over 122 languages in India, of which 22 are official languages that officials can use for record keeping. The most common in the second most populous country in the world is Hindi, which is considered native by about 480 million people, and most of the country's population, if not speaking, then understands.
1. Chinese
Of the 6.6 billion people living on earth, approximately 14.1% speak Chinese. Although there are many dialects of the Chinese language, Mandarin is the predominant dialect, which is the native language of 955 million Chinese.
Did you know that the world's most popular language is spoken by 1/7 of the world's population? And it's not English at all! There are more than 7,000 languages in the world, but 10 of them are the most popular. Is there a Russian language in this top ten? Answer under the cut...
No. 10 French - 150 million native speakers
French is spoken in 53 countries of the world, the main one being France. About 150 million speakers in the world. French is the official language of many international organizations: the European Union, the International Olympic Committee, the UN, etc.
№9. Indonesian- 200 million speakers
Indonesian is spoken in 16 countries, including Indonesia, and has the status of a working language in East Timor. Indonesia is an island state with more than 13 thousand islands.
The Indonesian language evolved from Malay in the 20th century and is the most widely spoken dialect of the Malay language.
No. 8. Portuguese - 240 million speakers
Portuguese is spoken in 12 countries around the world. Portuguese is the official language of Brazil.
In the 12th century, Portugal became independent from Spain and spread its possessions around the world thanks to navigators. Having founded colonies in Brazil, Angola, Macau, Mozambique, Venezuela and other countries, the Portuguese made their language one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. Portuguese is one of the official languages European Union and other international organizations.
No. 7. Bengali language - 250 million speakers
Bengali is spoken in Bangladesh and some states of India. For Bangladesh, Bengali is the official language and for India it is the second most spoken language.
No. 6. Russian - 260 million speakers
Russian is spoken in 17 countries of the world. Russian is the official language of Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Widely distributed in Ukraine, Latvia and Estonia. AT lesser degree in countries that were part of Soviet Union.
Russian is one of the six official languages of the UN, the most widely spoken language in Europe and the most widely spoken Slavic language in the world.
№5. Arabic- 267 million speakers
Arabic is spoken in 58 countries around the world. Largest number Arabic speakers are concentrated in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Egypt.
The Arabic language is also spreading around the world thanks to the main book of Muslims - the Koran. Arabic became the sixth official language of the UN in 1974.
No. 4. Spanish - 427 million native speakers
Spanish is spoken in 31 countries around the world. Spanish originated in Spain in the Middle Ages and spread throughout the world during the Great geographical discoveries. Spanish is the official language of international organizations: the UN, the European Union, the Union of South American Nations, etc.
No. 3. Hindi - 490 million speakers
Hindi is spoken in India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan.
Many predict that Hindi will soon become the most spoken language in the world and overtake China, but when and if this will happen remains unknown.
No. 2. English - 600 million native speakers
English is the most widely spoken language in the world in terms of the number of countries it covers - 106 countries. English is the official and primary language in the UK. In countries such as India, Ireland, New Zealand, Canada and the Philippines, English is used as an official language, but in addition to it, there are also their official languages.
No. 1. Chinese - 1.3 billion native speakers
Chinese is the official language of the People's Republic of China, Taiwan and Singapore. It is spoken by more than 1.3 billion people all over the world, and therefore it ranks first in the list of the most widely spoken languages in the world.
Chinese is considered the most difficult language in the world. Chinese is one of the six official languages of the United Nations.
Language is the main way people communicate, and this article presents the most popular, widespread and popular languages of the peoples of the world.
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14. French
Although this language is not among the ten most common languages in the world, in our small presentation it takes an honorable 14th place, opening our rating. The French language, in addition to being one of the most common, is also one of the most beautiful languages of the world, which is often called the language of love, just like the capital of France, the city of Paris, is called the city of love. This language is included in the Romance group of languages, has the status of an official language in 29 countries of the world, in particular in Canada, Switzerland, Belgium, Monaco and, of course, France. It is one of the six official languages of the UN and is spoken in a number of African countries, the former French colonies. According to some reports, about 250 million people around the world speak French, but it is native to 75 million.
Many people are studying French because of its beauty, others learn it because it is a fairly popular language in Europe and knowledge of such a language will be useful for work and travel. This language is not very difficult to learn as a foreign language. Of course, French will be easier for someone, more difficult for someone, but many agree that, in terms of learning difficulty, it is somewhere between German and Spanish.
13. Korean
Korean is the mother tongue of approximately 78 million people and is the official language South Korea and North Korea, partly distributed in China, Japan, the USA and Russia. This language is not very popular and not many people study it in other countries. Nevertheless, in terms of the number of native speakers, it takes an honorable 13th place in our ranking of the most widely spoken languages on earth. Most researchers attribute it to isolated languages, that is, to languages that are not included in any known language family. However, some believe that the Korean language may be part of a hypothetical Altai family. According to some linguists, Korean may have some degree of relationship with Japanese.
Some people find Korean easier to learn than Japanese and Chinese, but Korean grammar is still harder in their opinion. Chinese and Japanese are studied mainly for romantic reasons, because of the desire to get closer to the culture of the East and to know centuries of history region. The Korean language is taught mainly for earnings.
12. German
German is the most popular and demanded language in Europe after English, and many people learn it not for cultural reasons or for travel, but for doing business and business negotiations. German is the official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein and Belgium. This language is native to 100 million people, and there are more than 120 million native speakers. The German language is part of the Germanic group, like English, however German is considered much more difficult than English, as well as some other languages.
Beginners to learn a language are frightened by words that are 2-3 times longer than their counterparts in other languages, many tenses, conjugated in different ways, correct and Irregular Verbs, the presence of a certain and indefinite article, not always coinciding genders of nouns. Nevertheless, the German language cannot be called one of the most difficult languages of the peoples of the world, since with the proper approach it is studied without special problems like any other European language.
11. Javanese
There are so many languages in the world, but not many of our citizens, in principle, know about the existence of this language, not to mention the fact that the Javanese language is one of the most common. This language is spoken by about 105 million people and is spoken mainly on the Indonesian island of Java and a few neighboring islands. It is the largest Austronesian language in terms of the number of speakers. This is enough developed language which has a rich literary tradition with different genres poetry and prose, many varieties of theatrical genres. Despite the fact that almost half of the population of Indonesia actively uses the Javanese language in everyday life, it, like everyone else existing languages in the country, has no official status.
10 Punjabi
This language belongs to the Indo-Aryan languages of the Indo-European language family and is one of the official languages of India. Punjabi is the language of Punjabis and Jats, ethnic groups in India. The language is spoken in the eastern part of Pakistan, as well as in some parts of India. There are about 112 million Punjabi speakers in the world. About 105 million native speakers live in Pakistan and India. While the rest lives in countries such as the UK, Canada, the United Arab Emirates, the USA, etc. Among the features of the language, one can single out that it is a tonal language. AT tonal languages the height of the stressed syllable changes its meaning. In Punjabi, a stressed syllable can have three different pitches. For Indo-European languages This is very unusual.
9. Japanese
Ninth place in our list of the most common and popular languages in the world is another language from Asia. The native speakers of this language are 130 million people. The Japanese language is studied mainly for two reasons. Firstly, the language is studied for doing business, since Japan is one of the strongest economies in the world. Secondly, Japan has a rich and interesting culture, which attracts thousands of people and sooner or later makes them interested in the language of the country. Japanese is by no means an easy language. One of the main difficulties in learning this language is the hieroglyphs, which came from Chinese, but have changed a little over time in the development of the language.
AT Japanese almost all hieroglyphs have not one, but two or more sounds, depending on the words in which they are used. Today in Japan, the most commonly used are about two and a half thousand hieroglyphs, while in China, at least 3,500 hieroglyphs are used. The Japanese language is simpler when compared to Korean and Chinese, but Japanese grammar is very complex. There are no tones in Japanese, but there are two alphabets. The Hiragana alphabet is the main one, it is used for purely Japanese words, grammatical marking, and sentence endings. Katakana is another Japanese alphabet and is used for foreign words and names.
8. Russian
Russia is one of the most important countries in the world, occupying vast territory where many peoples live. Rich, vibrant and saturated culture and most beautiful cities The country attracts many foreigners who are also interested in the “mighty” Russian language. There are about 160 million people for whom Russian is their native language. In total, there are about 260 million Russian speakers. Russian is the official language in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. This is the most common Slavic in the world and the most widely spoken language in Europe in terms of the number of speakers for whom it is native. Russian is one of the working languages of the UN. It is quite difficult to learn, its grammar is complex but logical. Russian can be called one of the simple “complex” languages.
Many foreigners choose French or German because they are common in Europe. Russian is chosen when they want to get to know Russian culture, when there are Russian friends with whom you want to speak their language, when you move to live or work in Russia. Basically, they study the Russian language because they like it, like, in general, any other language. You cannot learn a language through force, it must be interesting and attractive, there must be a desire to learn it.
7. Bengali
The Bengali language is one of the languages of the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family. It is widely spoken and is the official language in Bangladesh and India. There are about 190 million people for whom this native language and about 260 million people who speak it. Some aspects of the language are often different in India and Bangladesh. The letter in most cases fully corresponds to the pronunciation. The writing of the language is based on Sanskrit and does not always take into account the changes and mergers of sounds that have occurred in the language over time. The history of the Bengali language dates back at least a millennium, as evidenced by the dating of the first literary monuments, and linguistic reconstruction data.
6. Portuguese
Portuguese is the native language of approximately 230 million people, and total speakers it reaches approximately 260 million people. It is the official language in Portugal, Brazil, Angola and some other countries. Most of native speakers live in Brazil. The Portuguese language is comparable in difficulty to learning with Spanish, French and Italian, as it is in the same group with them Romance languages. There are two main variants of the language, European Portuguese and Brazilian, as well as a number of varieties in Africa and Asia, differing from each other at the level of phonetics, vocabulary, spelling and grammar. AT African countries the European version of the Portuguese language is used with a large number of lexical borrowings from African languages.
5. Arabic
Arabic is spoken in 60 countries of the world, such as Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt and Libya, and in 26 of them it is official. One of the working languages of the UN and belongs to the Semitic branch of the Afroasian family of languages. The number of native speakers exceeds 245 million people, and the total number of people who speak it is more than 350 million. Arabic plays great importance in political and economic spheres, in energy and security. This is a very popular language and people who know it will always be able to find Good work. Arabic is one of the five most difficult languages in the world, there are many dialects of Arabic that differ significantly from each other.
4. Hindi
This language is one of the 23 official languages of India, and is also spoken in Pakistan and Fiji. The mother tongue is spoken by 260 million people, and total number Hindi speakers is approximately 400 million people. At a colloquial level, the Hindi language is almost indistinguishable from the other official language of India, Urdu. The last one is different a large number Arabic and Persian loanwords, as well as those that use Arabic alphabet, while the traditional Hindi script is syllabary devanagari. English is one of the official languages of India, but, nevertheless, according to some reports, Hindi is quite a promising language and it may become one of the most popular languages by 2050.
3. English
The top three of our list of the most popular and common languages opens English, which is the most common language to learn as a foreign language. This language is native to 350 million people, and the total number of speakers of it is about 1.4 billion people. English is one of the working languages of the UN, the official language of Australia, New Zealand, the USA, England, Canada and some other countries. English in the modern world plays huge role in many areas of life from politics and business, to culture and travel. This is due to the colonial policy british empire in the 19th century and the world influence of the United States of America at the present time.
English is also considered one of the easiest languages to learn, if not the easiest. However, this language also has its difficulties. In many countries around the world, English has been taught in schools for almost primary school like a foreign one.
2. Spanish
In second place is very beautiful language, which is official in Spain, Mexico, Costa Rica, Cuba and most countries in South America. Spanish is very similar to Italian and Portuguese, as it is in the same Romance group with them. Approximately 420 million people consider Spanish as their mother tongue, and about 500 million people speak it all over the world. It is the most widely spoken language Romanesque group, 9/10 of whose carriers live mainly in western hemisphere. It's pretty easy language to study, which in addition to the Spanish culture and the beauty of the language adds to the desire of foreigners to learn Spanish.
There are several dialects of the Spanish language, but the real, original Spanish considered to be Castilian. Spain has Castilian, Catalan, Basque and Galician dialects, while South America has five main dialect groups. The first group is used mainly in Cuba, in Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Panama, Colombia, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Mexico. The second in Peru, Chile and Ecuador. Third in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. The fourth group is the Argentine-Uruguayan-Paraguayan variant, which includes Eastern Bolivia. The fifth group is conditionally called Highland Latin American Spanish. This language is spoken by the inhabitants of Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, belonging to the Andes of Colombia and Venezuela, Quito (located at an altitude of 2800 m, the capital of Ecuador), the Peruvian mountain range and Bolivia.
1. Chinese
The Chinese language is a collection of very different dialects, and therefore is considered by most linguists as an independent language branch, consisting of separate, albeit related to each other, linguistic and dialect groups. In fact, the Chinese language is made up of many other languages. But at the same time, the hieroglyphs are one. Since the middle of the 20th century, after the reform in China, the writing of basic hieroglyphs has become much more simplified. The unified Chinese language is called Mandarin or simply Mandarin, which is called Putonghua in China. The Chinese language has 10 dialect groups and seven main traditional dialects.
Many consider Chinese the most difficult language to learn, more difficult than Japanese and Arabic. Mainly because it uses more than 3,000 characters, which are noticeably more difficult to write than Japanese or Korean. The use of tones in the language also makes it difficult to learn. Despite all the difficulties of learning, Chinese remains one of the most promising and sought-after languages in the world. It is native to 1.3 billion people and has over 1.5 billion speakers. China is one of strongest countries in many areas, one of the largest in terms of territory and the largest in terms of population. Nowadays, the Chinese language is very popular and interesting, both for doing business and for understanding. ancient culture on the planet.
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