If you’re looking for the Top 10 Most Spoken Languages in The World 2023, then you are at the right place. In this article, we will discuss the Top 10 Most Spoken Languages in The World 2023.
According to UNESCO’s “Language Vitality and Endangerment” report, there are about 7,000 known languages in the world, of which only 4% are widely used, and 90% may face extinction by the end of this century. Throughout the world, which is the most spoken language in the world. In fact, these most-used languages by humans are important achievements in the history of Earth’s civilization, representing the thoughts, cultures, and histories of different nations.
Today, We will take stock of the Top 10 Most Spoken Languages in The World that are popular so far. Let’s take a look at the Top 10 Most Spoken Languages in The World 2023.
Most Spoken Languages in The World
The list of the world’s most spoken languages is based on the total number of speakers of each known language (including native speakers and second language users), common countries/regions, the scope of use, historical development, and other factors. , some data refer to UNESCO’s “Language Vitality and Language Endangerment” report; therefore the data are for reference only, and the specific situations are introduced below.
Top 10 Most Spoken Languages in The World
10. Portuguese – 260 Milion Speakers
Portuguese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world after English and Spanish. Portuguese once ranked the 6th most popular language in the world.
Portuguese, referred to as Portuguese, belongs to the Indo-European language family – Romance language family – Western Romance branch. Portuguese is one of the few widely distributed languages in the world, and it is also the fifth (or sixth) most spoken language in the world. Portuguese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world after English and Spanish.
Portuguese is the sixth most popular language in the world, second only to Chinese, English, French, Spanish, and Arabic. The vast majority of Portuguese speakers live in Brazil, while only around 12 million speakers live in Portugal.
Countries and regions where Portuguese is the official or common language: Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, Sao Tome, Principe, Timor-Leste, and China. Although Portuguese is spoken by very few Chinese or Eurasian populations, Portuguese is still one of the official languages of China for historical reasons.
Portuguese is also one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. Countries and regions that use Portuguese as their official language or common language include: Brazil, Portugal, Angola, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, East Timor, etc. Among them, Brazil has become the largest Portuguese-speaking country in the world and the only Portuguese-speaking country in the Americas with a population of more than 200 million. Portuguese is the native language of Brazil.
The relationship between European Portuguese (Portuguese) and Brazilian Portuguese (Brazilian Portuguese) is similar to British English and American English: Brazilian Portuguese comes from Portuguese Portuguese, but due to historical reasons in Brazil, its pronunciation, grammar, And vocabulary are different from European Portuguese. European Portuguese is often used as the standard Portuguese. It has a huge vocabulary of Latin origins. Although it is very similar to other languages, you will still find the unique charm and color of Portuguese.
The difference between the two is mainly manifested in phonetics and vocabulary, and the difference in grammar is very small. The phonetic differences developed gradually over hundreds of years, so it does sound a little different. The difference in vocabulary is due to the fact that a lot of words from Tupi and African languages have been incorporated into Portuguese and Brazilian languages, resulting in some words in Portuguese and Portuguese that do not exist or have different meanings in Portuguese.
If a Brazilian and a Portuguese communicate orally, both sides can immediately distinguish that their pronunciation, vocabulary, and usage habits are different, but these differences will not affect the understanding of the two parties at all, at most, they are a little uncomfortable with each other at the beginning of the dialogue.
Brazilian Portuguese is greatly influenced by other languages (such as English and Spanish), and its pronunciation is also different from Portuguese. There are also differences in word spelling. There are also differences in grammar, for example, the pronouns in Brazil and Portugal are all prefixed~ but they are all Portuguese, and Brazilians and Portuguese can communicate.
9. Russian – 266 Milion Speakers
Russian is one of the working languages of the United Nations and one of the official languages of the Russian Federation.
Russian belongs to the East Slavic branch of the Slavic language family. It is mainly used in Russia and other member states of the former Soviet Union. In the member states of the Warsaw Pact, it was widely used as the first foreign language teaching in schools. During Soviet times, Russia was heavily emphasized in its republics. Although many countries of the former Soviet Union are now emphasizing the importance of local languages, Russian is still the most widely spoken language in these regions and the language of communication in these countries. Norwegian Russian is a mixture of Russian and Norwegian. It is the only official language of Russia and one of the official languages of Kyrgyzstan in Kazakhstan and Belarus.
Until 1917, Russian was the only official language of Tsarist Russia, but during the period of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, each member republic had its own official language, and Russian became the language of Russia’s integral role. After the drastic changes in Eastern Europe in 1989 and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991, independent countries encouraged their own mother tongue, thus reversing the situation of Russian dominance, but its role as a communication language for most Eastern European and Central Asian countries remained unchanged.
In Latvia, more than one-third of the Russian-speaking population comes mainly from pre-interwar Russian and Soviet immigrants. And the use of Russian in the classroom is still under debate. And in Estonia, Soviet-era immigrants and their descendants make up about a quarter of the country’s current population.
In Lithuania, the Russian-speaking population represents less than one-tenth of the country’s overall population. However, about 80% of the population of the Baltic region can converse in basic Russian. And in Finland, once part of Russia, there are still several Russian-speaking communities.
During the 20th century, Russian was widely spoken in schools in countries that were members of the Warsaw Pact, including Poland, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Albania. In addition, due to the influence of the Soviet Union, some Asian countries, such as Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Mongolia, still teach Russian. In several tribes of Afghanistan, Russian is still used as a mixed language. In Israel, Russian is spoken by at least 750,000 Soviet Jewish immigrants (1999 census). Russian is also frequently used in Israeli news, websites, and publications.
In North America, there are sizeable Russian-speaking communities, especially in urban areas of the United States and Canada such as New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Toronto, Miami, Chicago, and the Richmond Heights suburb of Cleveland. The Russian-speaking population in New York and Los Angeles alone is estimated to be 500,000. They publish their own newspapers and live in self-contained areas (especially with immigrants starting in the sixties). According to the U.S. census in 2000, 1.50% of the U.S. population speaks Russian, or about 4.2 million people, and it was once ranked tenth among U.S. languages.
From the beginning of the 20th century, there were also many Russian-speaking immigrants in Europe. There are three million Russian-speaking communities in Germany, Great Britain, Spain, France, Italy, Belgium, Greece, and Turkey. In China, they are mainly distributed in Yili, Tacheng, and Altay in the Uygur Autonomous Region, and Manzhouli and Ergun in Hulunbeier City in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, where Russians gather, and use Russian.
The phonetic system of Russia originated from the Slavic language group in the Indo-European language family, but it changed a lot in early history, and it was roughly formed around 1400. Later, Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin, Russia’s greatest poet, an outstanding representative of romantic literature, and the founder of realist literature, regulated the modern standard Russian language.
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8. Malay – 290 Milion Speakers
Malay and Indonesian are the same languages. It is the official language of Malaysia and Brunei, and one of the official languages of Singapore.
Malay in a broad sense refers to the languages belonging to the Indonesian language family of the Austronesian language family; Malay in a narrow sense refers to a language used in areas near the Straits of Malacca. In a narrow sense, Malay belongs to the Indonesian language group of the Austronesian language family in terms of language classification.
Before 1945, Malay was also spoken in many places outside of Sumatra. But after Indonesia declared independence from the Netherlands that year, the Malay language used in Indonesia was renamed Bahasa Indonesia. It belongs to the Indonesian branch of the Austronesian language family. Distributed in Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, southern Thailand, and Indonesia’s Sumatra, Riau, and Linga Islands. Malay was once the seventh most spoken language in the world.
The earliest remains of the Malay language are a few inscriptions on Srivijaya, dating to the 7th century, found in southeastern Sumatra. The difference between Malay and Indonesian can be compared to the difference between British English and American English. People who speak these two languages can basically communicate with each other, but there are differences in the phonetics and vocabulary of the writing system. Many loanwords in Malay are derived from Sanskrit and Arabic.
7. Bengali – 300 Milion Speakers
Bengali is the second largest language of the Iranian language family in India after Hindi. The dialect around Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, India, is recognized as the standard language of Bengali. Based on this, modern Bengali Mandarin and its written form Bengali vernacular have been widely used in the entire Bengali-speaking region.
The dialect in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, is obviously different from Mandarin Bengali, but Mandarin is commonly used in Dhaka. The famous Indian poet and writer Rabindranath Tagore used his mother tongue, Bengali, for literary creation.
One of the earliest Bengali texts is the 10th-century Buddhist poem Jorjabod. Bengali is the most oriental language of the Indo-European family, close to Assamese. Bengali is influenced by Austrian and Sino-Tibetan languages. In 1972, the Constitution of Bangladesh stipulated: “The official language of Bangladesh is Bengali.” There were 240 million people in the world who used Bengali. Making it the seventh most spoken language after Chinese, English, Hindi, Spanish, Arabic, and Portuguese.
It is worth mentioning that Bengali is the most oriental language in the Indo-European language family, close to Assamese. Bengali is influenced by Austrian and Sino-Tibetan languages.
It is mainly spoken in Bangladesh and parts of West Bengal, Tripura, and Assam in India. The text adopts the Bengali alphabet evolved from the ancient Indian Brahmi alphabet, with a total of 11 vowels and 40 consonants. Vowels generally have abbreviated forms. Bengali has distinct distinctions between voiced and voiced consonants, aspirated and unaspirated consonants, and retroflexed and non-retroflexed consonants.
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6. French – 300 Milion Speakers
French is the United Nations (UN) and its affiliated international organizations, the European Union (EU) and its affiliated institutions, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the International Organization of Francophonie (FIO), the World Trade Organization (WTO), the International Red Cross (IRC) ), NATO (NATO), FIFA (FIFA) and other international organizations’ official languages. In particular, the official languages of the IOC are French and English.
French is an independent language belonging to the Romance language family of the European Indo-European language family. The Romance languages include Central Romance (French, Italian, Sardinian dialect, Catalan, etc.), Western Romance (Spanish, Portuguese, etc.), and Eastern Romance (Romanian, etc.).
French is one of the independent Romance languages spoken by the largest number of speakers after Spanish. It is now spoken by 87 million people worldwide as their first language and by 300 million others (including those who speak it as a second language). French and Canadian French are the two largest branches of French in the world, and there is a big difference between them.
French is a phonetic language, and the meaning of words is mostly expressed through the combination of roots and affixes. The status of French is very high, because French is one of the six major languages in the United Nations, and France is also one of the permanent members of the United Nations. France is a country full of romance, so French also contains elements of the country. French is called “the most beautiful language in the world”.
French is the first language in the following countries: France (once spoken by 64 million people, including Guadeloupe, Martinique and Saint-Pierre, and Miquelon); Canada (6,700,000 speakers, especially Quebec, New Brunswick) Belgium (4,000,000 speakers, Walloon is a dialect of the Langue d’Oil language that differs significantly from Belgian French) Switzerland (co-existing with German, Italian, and Romansh ) Monaco French Guiana, Haiti.
French is also the main second language in the following countries: Algeria, Lebanon, Mauritius, Morocco, New Caledonia, Réunion, and Tunisia. It is the official language and the only language used in schools in the following countries: Comoros, Republic of the Congo, French Polynesia, Gabon, and Mali. It is an official language in the following countries, but not as commonly used as the vernacular: Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Madagascar, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Togo, Vanuatu and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is also a common language in Andorra and Luxembourg.
There are also some French speakers in Egypt, Pondicherry in India, Italy, Laos, Mauritania, the United Kingdom (River Island, Channel Islands), the United States (Acadia, Cajun), and Vietnam. La Francophonie was once an international organization of French-speaking and non-French-speaking countries and governments. The French have always been very proud of their language. During the colonial period, the British Empire brought English to the vast colonies; after World War II, the powerful United States continued to spread English around the world, making the status of the French continue to decline.
Because of the rigorous usage of French, important documents such as legal provisions are written in French internationally. The United Nations has designated English as the first spoken language and French as the first written language.
French used to be one of the six working languages of the United Nations, and it was widely used in international social and diplomatic activities. French is not only the official language of France but also the official language or common language of more than 40 countries and regions all over the five continents. French-speaking countries are very widely distributed. If English is the largest language in terms of the global distribution of languages, then French is the second-largest language.
French is the international dominant language of world civilization. It reached its most glorious period at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century. It is worth mentioning that on March 20, 2018, French President Emmanuel Macron announced in Paris that France will strengthen the promotion of French on a global scale, and plans to increase the number of French-speaking people in the world from the current 300 million to more than 700 million people till 2050. In order to achieve this goal, France will continue to strengthen the promotion of French in many parts of the world.
5. Arabic – 422 Milion Speakers
Arabic is also one of the six official languages of the United Nations. It is the official language of 19 Arab countries and 4 international organizations. International organizations that use Arabic: are the United Nations, the League of Arab States, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, and the African Union.
There are more than 200 million people who speak Arabic as their mother tongue. At the same time, Arabic is the religious language of Muslims all over the world. The total number of Arabic speakers worldwide has exceeded 400 million. Due to the wide distribution of Arabic, each country has its own dialect, while the standard Arabic is based on the Islamic classic “Quran”.
Arabic is the mother tongue of the Arab nation, and it is also the language used by nearly 1.5 billion Muslims in the world to perform religious homework. Every day in any corner of the world, you can hear the recitation of “Allahu Akbar” in Arabic Loud) the same sound. During the hundreds of years of the Middle Ages, Arabic was one of the languages spoken in academic culture throughout the civilized world.
Arabic is the language of the Arab nation, belonging to the Semitic language family of the Semitic language family. It is mainly spoken in Arab countries in West Asia and North Africa. It is the official language of the following nineteen countries: Saudi Arabia, Yemen, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Egypt, Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, Mauritania, Algeria, Morocco, etc.
Arabic is also the religious language of Muslims all over the world. The Islamic classic “Quran” is written and disseminated in Arabic. Muslims from all over the world can more or less understand part of Arabic.
Arabic is also one of the six official languages of the United Nations, and the other five are Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. The United Nations announced the top ten most difficult languages in the world to learn, and Arabic ranks third, second only to Chinese and Greek.
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4. Hindi – 528 Milion Speakers
Hindi is the most common language in India, and Hindi is an important minority language. It used to be the eighth most spoken language in the world in terms of the number of countries used. Urdu, which is related to Hindi, is the official language of Pakistan.
Hindi is a language under the Indo-European-Indian language family. Hindi is the 4th most spoken language in the world by a number of countries. It became the official language of the Central Government of India on January 26, 1965. Hindi and Urdu (collectively known as Hindustani) are similar, the main difference is that the former uses Devanagari letters, the latter uses Arabic letters, the former introduces a little more Sanskrit loanwords, and the latter uses Arabic and Persian loanwords a bit more.
Hindi is the most spoken language in India. There are also a considerable number of Indian residents in Mauritius, Fiji, the United States, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Suriname, and other places who speak Hindi.
Together, Hindi and Urdu are the second most spoken languages in the world, with more than 500 million speakers, second only to Chinese. A 1997 survey found that 66% of Indians could speak Hindi, and 77% of Indians regarded Hindi as the common language of the country. In India, about 422 million people speak Hindi as their mother tongue and another 300 million as their second language.
Urdu, which is in the same vein as Hindi, is the official language of Pakistan with more than 100 million speakers. In other countries, Hindi is an important minority language, such as Fiji, Guyana, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United Arab Emirates.
In India, Hindi is spoken in Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Bihar, Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Central State, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Uttaranchal states and other regions of the official language. In the southern states, especially in Tamil Nadu, Hindi is not spoken by many people. It is worth mentioning that most of the films in the Bollywood film industry base are shot in Hindi
Both Hindi and Urdu are based on Hindustani, a spoken language that has been used as a communicative language in many parts of India for more than four centuries.
When India gained independence in 1947, Hindi was chosen as the national language, but since it failed to win recognition from India’s other-language-speaking peoples, it had to share the status of official language with English.
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3. Spanish – 572 Milion Speakers
Spanish is one of the working languages of the United Nations and the official language of most countries in Latin America. The number of native speakers is second only to Chinese, ranking second in the world; the total number of speakers ranks No. three. Spanish is also the official language of the African Union, the European Union, and the United Nations.
Spanish has absorbed a large number of English words during its development. Some of these words have been Spanishized, and some have been transplanted intact, appearing in the dictionary of the Spanish Royal Academy of Languages and people’s daily life. middle. As the third largest language in the world, learners and users of Spanish as a second language are all over the world, and the number is still rising.
Several states in the southern United States, the Philippines, and parts of Africa (including Equatorial Guinea, Western Sahara, and the Spanish African territories of Ceuta and Melilla) also have a considerable number of users. It belongs to the western branch of the Romance language family of the Indo-European language family.
Spanish, or Castilian, is the third most spoken language in the world, most of which are spoken in Latin American countries. Many Spanish speakers refer to their language as Spanish, and many Spaniards who speak other languages refer to Spanish as Castilian).
In the United States, there are many native speakers of Spanish, and it is widely spoken in New York, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California (in New Mexico, Spanish and English are listed as official languages); in addition, in the Philippines, Morocco, Equatorial Spanish is also spoken in Guinea and the west coast of Africa.
Spanish is the official language of the African Union, the European Union, and the United Nations. Countries that use Spanish as an official language in the 21st century are Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela. Spanish is also spoken in Belize, Gibraltar, the Philippines, Trinidad and Tobago, and Western Sahara.
There are many different dialects of Spanish in Spain and Hispanic America. The pronunciation of the Castilian dialect in northern Spain is generally considered to be the standard pronunciation of Spanish. In America, the first Spaniards brought their localism. Significantly different dialect accents can still be found today in different parts of the Americas.
2. Mandarin Chinese – 1 Billion Speakers
Chinese has a long history and is one of the internationally common languages and one of the languages spoken by most people in the world. According to Xia Guozhu, former deputy director of the Cultural Exchange Department of the China Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, about 1 billion people are learning and using Chinese characters in recent years.
Chinese is an analytical language with three to fifteen tonnes. Chinese writing system Chinese characters are a kind of phonetic writing, which has both ideographic and phonetic functions. Chinese consists of written language and spoken language. Ancient written Chinese is called Classical Chinese, and modern written Chinese is called Baihua, which is regulated by modern standard Chinese.
Chinese is divided into standard language and dialect. Modern Standard Chinese uses Beijing phonetics as the standard pronunciation, the Northern dialect as the basic dialect, and typical modern vernacular works as the grammatical norms. There are five tones, and the online Xinhua Dictionary now contains 20,959 Chinese characters. In 2019, Chinese was officially included in the Russian “College Entrance Examination”.
Chinese is mainly circulated in China, as well as Chinese communities in Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Myanmar, Thailand, the United States, Canada, and other countries. Chinese is divided into standard languages and dialects, and dialects are subdivided into 13 languages according to the “International Organization for Standardization ISO 639-3”, such as Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien, Hakka, etc.
Chinese syllables can be analyzed into three parts: initials, finals, and tones. The first sound is the initial consonant, the rest is the final, and the tone is the pitch of the whole syllable. The reason why tones are regarded as a component of syllables is that tones in Chinese are differentiated. In language, they represent four different morphemes, and in writing they are written as 4 different words.
The consonants are all consonants. The most complex final consists of three parts: medial, main vowel, and final. Some rhyme endings are consonants and some are vowels.
1. English – 1.5 Billion Speakers
English is the most widely spoken language in the world and the most spoken language in the world. English is one of the working languages of the United Nations and has become one of the leading international languages, occupying a dominant position in many regions and professional fields.
English has been developed for more than 1,400 years. Since the 17th century, modern English has been widely spread around the world under the influence of the United States and Britain. Although English is not the language with the largest number of native speakers, it is learned as a second language by more people.
English, as a universal language in the world, is also the de facto language of international communication. English belongs to the West Germanic branch of the Germanic language family in the Indo-European language family. It evolved from the language spoken by the Germanic tribes of Anglo, Saxon, and Jutes who immigrated from the English-speaking continent of Europe in ancient times and spread through British colonial activities. to all over the world.
Because English has been in contact with many national languages in history, its vocabulary has changed from unitary to pluralistic. The grammar has changed from “more twists and turns” to “fewer twists and turns”, and the pronunciation has also undergone regular changes. English is the most widely spoken language in the world, based on the number of native speakers of English. But it may be the second or fourth largest language in the world (380,000,000 people use English in 1999), more than 60% of letters in the world are written in English, and more than 50% of newspapers and magazines are in English.
English is also the language most closely related to computers. Most programming languages are related to English, especially with the use of the Internet, and the use of English has become more popular. The closest equivalent to English is undoubtedly Frisian, which is still spoken in the province of Friesland in the north of the Netherlands, with about 500,000 speakers. It is worth mentioning that the Normans conquered England in the 11th century and brought a large amount of French vocabulary, which greatly enriched the English vocabulary.
There used to be 175 English-speaking countries and regions in the world. For example, English is used as the official language: in the United Kingdom, Australia, the Bahamas, Botswana (the national language is Setswana), Canada (along with French), Fiji (the national language is Fijian), Kenya (along with Kiswahili), Kiribati, Nigeria, Pakistan (the national language is Urdu), Barbados, Bermuda, Ireland (second language, first language Irish), South Africa (along with Afrikaans, Ndebele, Northern Sotho, Sotho, Swazi, Tsonga, Tswa Na, Venda, Bantu, Zulu), New Zealand (customary official language; other by law is Māori), Singapore (along with Malay, Tamil, and Chinese. National language is Malay), Philippines, Gambia, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico (along with Spanish), Zambia, Namibia, the United States and other parts of the country.
It is worth mentioning that the U.S. federal government does not have an official language, and English is the customary first language, not legally mandated. English is an official language in the following states or territories: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii (along with Hawaiian), Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Mexico (along with Spanish), North Carolina, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia, Wyoming], Malta, Ghana, Nigeria. Sudan (along with Arabic), the Republic of South Sudan (along with Arabic)
