Ranked: The 100 Most Spoken Languages Worldwide

Even though you’re reading this article in English, there’s a good chance it might not be your mother tongue. Of the billion-strong English speakers in the world, only 33% consider it their native language.

The popularity of a language depends greatly on utility and geographic location. Additionally, how we measure the spread of world languages can vary greatly depending on whether you look at total speakers or native speakers.

Today’s detailed visualization from WordTips illustrates the 100 most spoken languages in the world, the number of native speakers for each language, and the origin tree that each language has branched out from.

How Do You Define A Language?

The data comes from the 22nd edition of Ethnologue, a database covering a majority of the world’s population, detailing approximately 7,111 living languages in existence today.

The definitions of languages are often dynamic, blurring the lines around a singular understanding of what makes a language:

Linguistic: focused on lexical and grammatical differences, or on variations within speech communities

Social: focused on cultural or political factors, as well as heritage and identity

For the purposes of measurement, the researchers use the ISO 693-3 set of criteria, which accounts for related varieties and dialects—ensuring that linguistics are not the only factor considered in this count of languages.

Here are the language origins of the 100 most spoken languages:

Indo-European languages have the widest spread worldwide. According to Ethnologue, the language family contains over 3 billion speakers in total. Interestingly, there are actually 1,526 Niger-Congo languages altogether, though only 12 are represented here.

Let’s now dive into the top 10 most spoken languages overall.

Which Languages Have the Most Speakers?

It comes as no surprise that English reigns supreme, with over 1.1 billion total speakers—or roughly 15% of the global population. Mandarin Chinese, Hindi, Spanish, and French round out the top five.

Rank Language Total Speakers Language Origin 1 English 1,132 million Indo-European 2 Mandarin Chinese 1,117 million Sino-Tibetan 3 Hindi 615 million Indo-European 4 Spanish 534 million Indo-European 5 French 280 million Indo-European 6 Standard Arabic 274 million Afro-Asiatic 7 Bengali 265 million Indo-European 8 Russian 258 million Indo-European 9 Portuguese 234 million Indo-European 10 Indonesian 199 million Austronesian

However, this is only one piece in the full fabric of languages.

The metrics for native speakers tell a slightly different tale, as Mandarin Chinese shoots up to 918 million—almost 2.5x that of English native speakers.

Rank Language Native Speakers Language Origin 1 Mandarin Chinese 918 million Sino-Tibetan 2 Spanish 460 million Indo-European 3 English 379 million Indo-European 4 Hindi 341 million Indo-European 5 Bengali 228 million Indo-European 6 Portuguese 221 million Indo-European 7 Russian 154 million Indo-European 8 Japanese 128 million Japanic 9 Western Punjabi 93 million Indo-European 10 Marathi 83 million Indo-European

Note: No native speaker data was available for Filipino, Standard Arabic, Nigerian Pidgin, or Cameroonian Pidgin.

Here, Spanish comes in strong second for native speakers with 460 million, considering it’s well-used across Latin America. The Indian languages of Hindi and Bengali cap off the top five by native speakers as well.

These are the biggest languages people learn growing up, but what about the ones they pick up later in life?

What About Second (L2) Languages?

Nearly 43% of the world’s population is bilingual, with the ability to switch between two languages with ease.

From the data, second language (L2) speakers can be calculated by looking at the difference between native and total speakers, as a proportion of the total. For example, 66% of English speakers learned it as a second language.

Swahili surprisingly has the highest ratio of L2 speakers to total speakers—although it only has 16 million native speakers, this shoots up to 98 million total speakers. Overall, 82% of Swahili speakers know it as a second language.

Swahili is listed as a national or official language in several African countries: Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It’s likely that the movement of people from rural areas into big cities in search of better economic opportunities, is what’s boosting the adoption of Swahili as a second language.

Indonesian is another similar example. With a 78% proportion of L2 speakers compared to total speakers, this variation on the Malay language has been used as the lingua franca across the islands for a long time. In contrast, only 17% of Mandarin speakers know it as a second language, perhaps because it is one of the most challenging languages to learn.

Keeping Language Traditions Alive

Languages are fluid, and constantly evolving—altogether, the 100 most spoken languages paint a unique picture across centuries of a changing world. Here’s the full list of these languages, by types of speakers and language origin.

Rank Language Total Speakers Native Speakers Origin 1 English 1,132M 379M Indo-European 2 Mandarin Chinese 1,117M 918M Sino-Tibetan 3 Hindi 615M 341M Indo-European 4 Spanish 534M 460M Indo-European 5 French 280M 77M Indo-European 6 Standard Arabic 274M NA Afro-Asiatic 7 Bengali 265M 228M Indo-European 8 Russian 258M 154M Indo-European 9 Portuguese 234M 221M Indo-European 10 Indonesian 199M 43M Austronesian 11 Urdu 170M 69M Indo-European 12 Standard German 132M 76M Indo-European 13 Japanese 128M 128M Japanic 14 Swahili 98M 16M Niger-Congo 15 Marathi 95M 83M Indo-European 16 Telugu 93M 82M Dravidian 17 Western Punjabi 93M 93M Indo-European 18 Wu Chinese 82M 81M Sino-Tibetan 19 Tamil 81M 75M Dravidian 20 Turkish 80M 69M Turkic 21 Korean 77M 77M Koreanic 22 Vietnamese 77M 76M Austronesian 23 Yue Chinese 74M 73M Sino-Tibetan 24 Javanese 68M 68M Austronesian 25 Italian 68M 65M Indo-European 26 Egyptian Spoken Arabic 65M 65M Afro-Asiatic 27 Hausa 63M 44M Afro-Asiatic 28 Thai 61M 21M Kra-Dai 29 Gujarati 61M 56M Indo-European 30 Kannada 56M 44M Dravidian 31 Iranian Persian 53M 53M Indo-European 32 Bhojpuri 52M 52M Indo-European 33 Southern Min Chinese 50M 50M Sino-Tibetan 34 Hakka Chinese 48M 48M Sino-Tibetan 35 Jinyu Chinese 47M 47M Sino-Tibetan 36 Filipino 45M NA Austronesian 37 Burmese 43M 33M Sino-Tibetan 38 Polish 40M 40M Indo-European 39 Yoruba 40M 38M Niger-Congo 40 Odia 38M 34M Indo-European 41 Malayalam 38M 37M Dravidian 42 Xiang Chinese 37M 37M Sino-Tibetan 43 Maithili 34M 34M Indo-European 44 Ukrainian 33M 27M Indo-European 45 Moroccan Spoken Arabic 33M 27M Afro-Asiatic 46 Eastern Punjabi 33M 33M Indo-European 47 Sunda 32M 32M Austronesian 48 Algerian Spoken Arabic 32M 29M Afro-Asiatic 49 Sudanese Spoken Arabic 32M 32M Afro-Asiatic 50 Nigerian Pidgin 30M NA Indo-European 51 Zulu 28M 12M Niger-Congo 52 Igbo 27M 27M Niger-Congo 53 Amharic 26M 22M Afro-Asiatic 54 Northern Uzbek 25M 25M Turkic 55 Sindhi 25M 25M Indo-European 56 North Levantine Spoken Arabic 25M 25M Afro-Asiatic 57 Nepali 25M 16M Indo-European 58 Romanian 24M 24M Indo-European 59 Tagalog 24M 24M Austronesian 60 Dutch 23M 23M Indo-European 61 Sa'idi Spoken Arabic 22M 22M Afro-Asiatic 62 Gan Chinese 22M 22M Sino-Tibetan 63 Northern Pashto 21M 21M Indo-European 64 Magahi 21M 21M Indo-European 65 Saraiki 20M 20M Indo-European 66 Xhosa 19M 8M Niger-Congo 67 Malay 19M 16M Austronesian 68 Khmer 18M 17M Austronesian 69 Afrikaans 18M 7M Indo-European 70 Sinhala 17M 15M Indo-European 71 Somali 16M 16M Afro-Asiatic 72 Chhattisgarhi 16M 16M Indo-European 73 Cebuano 16M 16M Austronesian 74 Mesopotamian Spoken Arabic 16M 16M Afro-Asiatic 75 Assamese 15M 15M Indo-European 76 Northeastern Thai 15M 15M Kra-Dai 77 Northern Kurdish 15M 15M Indo-European 78 Hijazi Spoken Arabic 15M 15M Afro-Asiatic 79 Nigerian Fulfulde 14M 14M Niger-Congo 80 Bavarian 14M 14M Indo-European 81 Bamanankan 14M 4M Niger-Congo 82 South Azerbaijani 14M 14M Turkic 83 Northern Sotho 14M 5M Niger-Congo 84 Setswana 14M 6M Niger-Congo 85 Souther Sotho 14M 6M Niger-Congo 86 Czech 13M 11M Indo-European 87 Greek 13M 13M Indo-European 88 Chittagonian 13M 13M Indo-European 89 Kazakh 13M 13M Turkic 90 Swedish 13M 10M Indo-European 91 Deccan 13M 13M Indo-European 92 Hungarian 13M 13M Uralic 93 Jula 12M 2M Niger-Congo 94 Sadri 12M 5M Indo-European 95 Kinyarwanda 12M 12M Niger-Congo 96 Cameroonian Pidgin 12M NA Indo-European 97 Sylheti 12M 10M Indo-European 98 South Levantine Spoken Arabic 12M 12M Afro-Asiatic 99 Tunisian Spoken Arabic 12M 12M Afro-Asiatic 100 Sanaani Spoken Arabic 11M 11M Afro-Asiatic

One reason these languages are popular is that they are actively and consistently used. Unfortunately, nearly 3,000 (about 40%) of all languages are at risk of being lost, or are already in the process of dying out today.

Languages play a crucial role in our daily lives. … [Their] losses have huge negative impacts indigenous peoples’ most basic human rights.

—UN, IYoIL statement

As a result, the United Nations declared 2019 the International Year of Indigenous Languages (IYoIL), with a resolution to continue fostering these languages and pass on their knowledge for future generations.