If any of you have ever tried learning a foreign language you know that the hardest step is often the first – choosing which one. There are over 6,000 languages in use today and roughly 30% are spoken by 1,000 people or less. So, to make your job easier, in this list we are ranking the 25 most influential languages in the world. Keep in mind, however, that some languages with relatively few speakers (like Italian) will outrank languages with hundreds of millions of speakers (like Bengali). This is because the rankings are not just done according to how many people speak the language. Of course this is taken into consideration but so is how many people speak it as a second language, its impact on global commerce and trade, and its lingua franca status around the world.
Although it is spoken by almost 80 million people in North Korea, South Korea, and China, it has not achieved a significant level of influence beyond the borders of the Korean Peninsula. It is also one of the hardest languages for foreigners to learn and the U.S. government classifies it as a category IV language along with Arabic and Japanese. This means that it requires at least 63 weeks of instruction to achieve a workable level of fluency as opposed to only 25 weeks for Spanish or French.
Despite having only 1/20th the number of the speakers as its counterpart (60 million), Cantonese has a much more global reach than Mandarin. Not only is it spoken in southern China and Hong Kong, but also in Chinese communities around the world. While it is technically spoken by around 25 million people, the official language of Thailand has a number of mutually intelligible dialects that brings the total number of speakers to around 60 million.
With approximately 90 million speakers Punjabi is the 10th most spoken language in the world and although it is the primary language of the Indian state of Punjab most of its 90 million speakers reside in Pakistan. As far as having global influence, Punjabi hardly compares to some of the other languages on this list but with so many speakers it was bound to end up here somewhere. Not to be confused with Japanese, Javanese is also the primary language of an eastern Asian island. Java, found in Indonesia, is the worlds most populous island which gives Javanese a total number of native speakers numbering close to 90 million.
As the second most widely spoken Slavic language after Russian, Polish speakers stand at about 46 million strong. Although there are numerous communities of Polish speakers living abroad, Polish is not nearly as influential a language as some of its other European counterparts. Spoken by roughly 90 million people, Vietnamese doesn’t rank any higher due to the fact that it is used almost exclusively in Vietnam. The language has, however, begun to propagate beyond the country’s borders as immigrants take it with them to Europe and America. As the language of the most dominant power in the Middle East and one of the largest economies in the world, Turkish is spoken by 83 million people primarily in Turkey but also in various regions around Central Asia. With over 200 million speakers, Bengali is the sixth most spoken language in the world. The only reason it is so far behind the other 5 (who rank much higher on this list) is because it is primarily spoken in only one very small geographical region – the extremely densely populated country of Bangladesh. With a total of around 50 million speakers, the mutually intelligible languages of Dutch and Africaans (Africaans is a daughter language spoken in South Africa that formed out of Dutch dialects) find significant usage everywhere from Europe to South America to Indonesia. In the European Union it has 65 million speakers but if you count the numerous regions abroad where it is spoken as a second language then the number gets closer to 90 million. Of note, it is the official language of the Vatican and carries considerable weight in the worlds of music (particularly opera), international sports, and design/fashion. Spoken primarily in several southern Indian states, Tamil also holds official language status in Sri Lanka and Singapore. It is one the oldest languages still in use today and has around 80 million total speakers. Used extensively along the east coast of Africa as the language of trade, Swahili has upwards of 100 million speakers (only a small portion are native) and is the official language of several countries. It’s influence is steadily growing and many major international news outlets now feature Swahili language broadcasts.
With over a hundred million speakers, Farsi holds official status in Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan and has a long history of being regarded as a “prestigious cultural language” throughout Central Asia. In Malaysia its known as Malaysian while in Indonesia it is known as Indonesian. Although the nomenclature can get a bit confusing, Malay as a whole is spoken in numerous countries throughout the region accounting for hundreds of millions of speakers.
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as an indian my national language is the best , sweetest, meaningful for me. HINDI
Tomas is right. I’m a Spaniard from Madrid spain. The Portuguese aren our neighbours and we respect them and their very widespread beautiful world language. We understand Portuguese by far than any other language. When you know Portuguese or spanish, you can communicate really well with one another without even needing to study it formally – that’s how close they are. The future looks great for the Portuguese and spanish languages. Portuguese has the real advantage because of its position as the national and official language of Brasil – that countryis HALF of South America!! And then there is Angola which is fast becoming the Brazil of Africa! I admit it, Portuguese is more widespread than even spanish, because there are countries that have Portuguese as their official language across the globe. The Spanish speaking countries are many, but they are only restricted to S. and Central America. Brazil never splintered into many countries and that is why they are a GIANT nation in every way. And Angola and Mozambique in Africa are HUGE countries too!! I predict that in 25 years the Portuguese language will number 450 million!!! I know that Spanish speakers, particularly Spaniards, don’t like to admit this, but facts are facts, and respect has to be given where deserved.
Some people have said it already, Portuguese is the language to watch for. People have ignored this language for too long. Little do people realize that it is the 5th or 6th most spoken major language in the world with close to 250 million speakers on every continent. China does do lots of trade with every Portuguese speaking country, particularly Brazil, angola, Mozambique, etc. the economies of these countries are growing by leaps and bounds with Brazil poised to become a world economic superpower. It is already the world’s 5th largest economy. Now,with the 2014 world cup and 2016 olympics global sports venues fast approaching, people are getting on the language bandwagon to learn Portuguese as a 2nd or 3rd language. I know that this has been said before, but once you know Portuguese, it is very, very true that Spanish is almost automatically gifted, and the Spanish speakers benefit this way too. These are all very valid reasons for the ensured growth and prosperity of the beautiful Portuguese language.
Some of the errors in this articles which I can identify:
1. The “bad taste” in regard to former soviet states is true to some of their politicians, but not the people. Coming from a post-soviet state myself, the current generation actually demands that Russian is put back in schools as a mandatory subject, and many tend to boast about holding a good command of it.
2. Japan’s economy isn’t really as great today as it was before, many of the widely acclaimed Japanese brands no longer are able to generate profit from the products they are famous for and thus resort to secondary money-making opportunities, like insurance. All major Japanese electronics brands are quickly losing to their Korean counterparts, and the companies are no longer attractive for potential shareholders.
3. Japanese is not a “notoriously difficult” language. It’s a baby-language that partially relies on the Chinese writing system (which in turn is in fact difficult). I should know since I study it in university
tamil is great
2016 Olympics will be held in Brazil too I meant, in additional to the 2014 World Cup. Viva the Portuguese language!
And….Portuguese will be further bolstered because the 2014 World Cup will be held in Brazil, and the 2016 will be in Brazil as well. Now, could you ask for a better motivation for wanting to learn Portuguese with these two venues held in Brazil? Portuguese language is going to be centre stage in the next 3/4 years, and the momentum will continue………………………..
I say that Portuguese is coming up really fast. It has a global presence with Brazil and Angola leading the economic charge. China does lots of trade with almost all of the Portuguese speaking countries – even the Chinese are learning Portuguese. In South America 51% of the speakers have Portuguese as their primary language. People all over the world are choosing to learn Portuguese as a 2nd or 3rd language. I predict that in 20 years Portuguese will surpass Russian and Arabic, if not already. There are certainly many more speakers of Portuguese than French.
Portuguese has good fortune on its side: spoken on all continents, China is doing tons of trade with Brazil, Angola, Mozambique (all have Portuguese as official language), spoken officially in countries i.e., Brazil, Angola, Mozambique with booming economies, and, if you speak Portuguese you are practically gifted Spanish since Portuguese and Spanish are so close.
Portuguese is NOT spoken in South Africa and Namibia! Get you facts straight. I live in SA. Portuguese will get you absolutely nowhere in both countries. Google them both, not one of them has it as an official or national language. All the Angolans and people from Mozambique living in SA have to learn to speak English. The official languages of both countries are English and Afrikaans along with other indigenous languages. My Angolan friend had to learn English when she came to SA. Most educated people from non-English speaking Sub-Saharan African countries speak English because the most developed African are in Southern Africa which-except from Angola and Mozambique-speak English.
Obviously, the author has not lived in Asia… this ranking is based on a western-centric view of the world… otherwise, Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, and Korean should be ranked higher. Not only are those countries quite populous, but they have sizeable communities overseas.
Actually no they shouldn’t be. Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, and Korean do not have such a big community overseas. They are hard to learn and when it comes down to it, they are entirely worthless to learn. The only reason you would learn these is for business at the global level. It makes sense when you think about more than just your preference.
Punjabi is in fact 2nd language in UK officially
And Urdu may be official lingua Franca of Pakistan but 95% of populace speak Punjabi
You are foolish if you think that Punjabi is ’2nd language in UK officially’. It is French! You are Writing in English now and not Punjabi which will go nowhere on the internet. Read and understand- the article says ‘Most Influential’ languages and not ‘Languages with the most native speakers.’ Punjabi will not get you anywhere outside India & Pakistan.
Mr or Ms TEE,
you have no idea what you are talking about, first of all the facts in this article are not right at all. And secondly you have no idea of the number or Panjabi language speakers around the world. Don’t shoot in the dark, it is not going to take you any where.
Punjabi language also has a large number of speakers in north america, in fact Punjabi is the 4th most common language spoken in Canada. It should be hi-lighted on the north american map as well.
You are right… What this list fails to do is having highlighted other international languages fails to point out officially the 2nd language in UK is Punjabi which us also spoken in Canada, USA, Kenya, Pakistan , Australia et al
Only by Indians and Pakistanis. Get your head out of nationalistic clouds!
You should get your head out of imperialistic clouds.
Where? I have never heard of Punjabi until I read it in the comments. It is not a widely used language in the US and Canada. I’m pretty sure the same can be said for Europe. Get your facts straight.
Have you ever visited Vancouver canada, you will start seeing sings in Panjabi language and all the audio announcements at the airport are in English and Panjabi, and the you go on the streets of Surrey BC you will see road signs in Panjabi, this is in canada, why would canadian government put up road signs in Panjabi if there no one there who speaks Panjabi. And then majority of the national banks in Vancouver and Toronto do put up signs and have Panjabi speaking staff on their teams. The local doctors and dentist offices can’t function without Panjabi speaking Staff. Come to Toronto and I can show you how widely the Panjabi language is used. We have local Panjabi TV and radio channels running 24 hours, why would a media company run a TV and Radio channels in a language if there no one to listen to that language. Canada’s national channel CBC telecast national hockey games with Panjabi commentary. There are so many other examples I can tell you if you are interested to hear. Panjabi is the third most spoken language here.
Since no one over 20 is gonna learn Mandarin without moving to China first why bother @ all? It pays to be realist. Learn 2, 3 other things – like languages – instead of not learning @ the end.
Portuguese should be in 5th, just look at how widespread it is on a map. There are currently 240 million speakers. Portuguese is becoming very popular and growing each day – it’s spoken on five continents. If you know Portuguese you are immediately in the know for Spanish given the very close proximity of the two. That is a huge advantage.
We’re not in the fifties anymore dude. Have you tried (I did) speaking french anywhere out of EU, a few places in Africa (if you can call that french, that is) or in the crazy part of Canada? Now, given the chance of learning a language ‘instantly”, who would choose french over say mandarin or spanish? I thought so
absolutely right
arabic, russian and portuguese more influential than german.? how come?
Portuguese, Speak in all continents, more ppl speak than german, and in more countries and in hispanoamerica it’s very important. Moreover the ppl speak spanish can understan portuguese.
But why spanish are in third position? Have more natives speakers than inglish, and in more countries.
French I think are in 4 or 5 position… And spanish in 2 position, and maybe in 20-30 years can stay in 1 position (if mandarin dont win)
I know everyone is entitled to his/her own opinion, but I’d go with Bill G’s comment. Majority of the comments are rather of individual perceptions. The main drawback on this piece is the lack statistical data used in judgment. I’d presume the author used his mere thoughts and assupmtions without qualitative referencing to back it up.
The whole ranking is supposedly based on influence? What kind of influence? How are you measuring it? Come on, you really expect us to believe a rank without any actual stats to go with it…? There is lots of explaining to do. Mostly the data you used to produce the ranks!!! Variables, time period, types of influence, other measures…. A good start would be explaining why is Russian so high up? I can only see population size as argument. How can German and Portuguese be less influential than Russian? Look at how geographically confined Russian is.
Why is everyone downgrading the huge influence the French language has and will have in the world. Although French doesn’t have that much native speakers as Spanish or Portuguese, it is widely used as a lingua franca in much of Africa. Coincidentally, the same Africa with the highest birth rates in the world which will obviously mean great increases in the number of French-speakers. Sure the quality spoken is probably not that well compared to standard French, but more and more Africans will let their children switch to French to broaden their children’s opportunities. And just a reality check for some Americans, just because Spanish is big where you live, doesn’t mean it’s as influential elsewhere. P.S. Josh, Quebec isn’t an island…
Enlish is the convinient language in the world, most of the people are talking to this language.
This statement is not true at all
While I won’t call it the most convenient, it is definitely in number 1 spot for most widely used. Spanish is confined only to South America and Spain. In the US, it is only a second language in some parts. Mandarin will get you nowhere outside China and parts of East Asia. Same thing with Punjabi and Bengali. They have a lot of native speakers but are too confined to one place. The article says MOST INFLUENTIAL and not Language with the most speakers. You will have a better chance of surviving in South America, Europe, North America or Africa with English than, lets say Mandarin or Urdu or whatever. Simple logic. All of you on this site are communicating in English. The language with the most articles and the most used language on the net is English. The most popular songs, movies e.t.c are in English. The Olympics is always hosted in English and another language and vice versa.
I think, Bengali should be ranked higher. Did you know that second most spoken language in India after Hindi is Bengali. Bengali is more unified language than Hindi, Arabic and many other languages. Right now, most of the Bengal region (where Bengali is spoken) is poor but soon or later, it will be developed and you can bet it will be one of most influential language in the world.
It still won’t beat English.
It’s a great article but allow me to pin-point an inaccuracy within the English language section of this article.
Although China is the most populous country in the world, not many Chinese speak English as an additional language. Indian, in this regard, beats China by far.
Only about 10% of India’s total population – of 1.2 billion – speaks English, that too as a second or a third language, accounting for about 120 million English speakers. The only country that might have more number of English speakers is the USA. Having read statistics that date back to more than a decade, I am confident that the gap has been almost entirely closed.
China, on the other hand, has about 10 million English speaker, a meagre 1% of its population of about 1.3 billion people.
Considering that Brasil has 200 million people, you are forgetting all the rest of the world. In the countries around Brasil there’s a lot of portuguese speakers (millions), Portugal has 10 million, in France, Germany, Luxemburg, Switzerland, USA, South Africa and Canada (only to mention the major emigration destinies), there are several millions too, not forgetting Angola, Moçambique, India, Malasia, Macau, Timor-Leste, Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Principe, all countries with portuguese as official language or with communities still speaking portuguese that would contribute to increase the numbers a lot more.
Don’t forget also that Brasil is growing economically and spreading the importance of language and that they are spread all over the world. The same with Angola.
It should be on 3rd or 4th, after English, Mandarin and Spanish. French is losing its importance and shouldn’t be where it is.
Very well put Jose. Portuguese is definitely growing in popularity in the world. Currently it is spoken by approx. 240 million. Brazil and Angola are huge economic powerhouses, which means more and more people are going to want to learn it as a second language. It is already compulsory in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and soon many more countries. There are millions of Portuguese speakers all over the world. Plus, if you know Portuguese you are automatically gifted Spanish since it is so close (89%) to Portuguese in vocabulary, grammar and sentence structure. If you look on a map Portuguese is quite widespread throughout the world in terms of countries that speak it officially. That means it will soon be another official language of the United Nations.
frog attitude. It is great to visit paris but the world is full of people who speak at least some English.
I believe that Spanish and French should be tied, at number 2.
These are the factors that elevate Spanish over French:
Spanish has 5 times the amount of native speakers as French. Some mention quality over quantity, and I can assure that there are hundreds of millions of native Spanish speakers that are quality!
It is spoken on a continent-wide level -natively- from the southernmost US to Tierra del Fuego. French spoken by native speakers is confined to France and -sections- of a couple neighbors, the island of Quebec, and few spots in Africa like Abidjan and Dakar, and a few islands in the Indian and Pacific oceans. If Spanish were ever to become an official language in some capacity in the US and if it were possible to study at Spanish speaking universities accredited by State education departments, then Spanish would vie for position as a topped ranked language even with English. Only the future can tell.
The problem with these rankings is that its like comparing Apples and Oranges. If you are a Russian living near the Chinese border learning English, French or Spanish would be of little concern to you and Mandarin would be paramount. If you are an English speaking US citizen living in Miami Spanish would be a much more pressing language to learn all things being equal then say, Polish. It all depends on who you are and where you are and why you need to learn a language.
Influence of language is very dependent on area in which you live. I live in Perth Australia, mandarin at #5, in Perth it is second only to English in importance due to trade, while Africaans #16 and Vietnamese #19 are key languages spoken by around 1/5 of the city population, but take Spanish at #3 is nowhere to be found here other than a few South American migrants, while in, say southern California, Spanish is as important if not more than English.
everyone’s opinion of this article will be in perspective
How is Thai technically only spoken by 25 million people? Wouldn’t Thai be technically spoken by about 70,000,000 people since that’s the population? Even if you were to assume that some citizens don’t speak Thai, it wouldn’t be less than half of the population. Egregiously innaccurate. This list is rubbish.
You are correct in saying that the population of Thailand is 70 million (more like 66). You are incorrect, however, in assuming that simply because Thai is the official language that more than half of the population should speak it. Do you realize that there are numerous countries in the world with official languages spoken by virtually none of their citizens? Of course, this is a foreign concept to western minds but the fact remains….Thai has roughly 25 million native speakers. The rest of the population speaks either regional dialects or other languages altogether. Besides, what actually constitutes “Thai” has been hotly debated and in a country as diverse as Thailand you have hundreds of different languages being spoken anyway. In fact, here’s a quick sample:
1. Aheu
2. Akeu
3. Akha
4. Ban Khor Sign Language
5. Bisu
6. Blang
7. Bru, Western
8. Cham, Western
9. Chiangmai Sign Language
10. Chinese, Hakka
11. Chinese, Mandarin
12. Chinese, Min Dong
13. Chinese, Min Nan
14. Chinese, Yue
15. Chong
16. Hmong Daw
17. Hmong Njua
18. Iu Mien
19. Karen, Pa’o
20. Karen, Phrae Pwo
21. Karen, Pwo Northern
22. Karen, Pwo Western Thailand
23. Karen, S’gaw
24. Kayah, Eastern
25. Kensiu
26. Khmer, Northern
27. Khmu
28. Khün
29. Kintaq
30. Korean
31. Kuy
32. Lahu
33. Lahu Shi
34. Lamet
35. Lawa, Bo Luang
36. Lawa, Mae Hong Son
37. Lisu
38. Lü
39. Lua’
40. Mal
41. Malay, Pattani
42. Malay, Satun
43. Mlabri
44. Mok
45. Moken
46. Moklen
47. Mon
48. Mpi
49. Nyahkur
50. Nyaw
51. Nyeu
52. Palaung, Pale
53. Phu Thai
54. Phuan
55. Phunoi
56. Prai
57. Pray 3
58. Saek
59. Shan
60. Sô
61. Tai Dam
62. Tai Nüa
63. Tai Ya
64. Thai
65. Thai Sign Language
66. Thai Song
67. Thai, Northeastern
68. Thai, Northern
69. Thai, Southern
70. Tonga
71. Ugong
72. Urak Lawoi’
73. Yong
74. Yoy
Simply listing out a wikipedia article of different nationalities isn’t an argument. There are different dialects, but they are all Thai. With your logic, would you say that American English and British English are different languages? It may be so, but it is not in line with the logic of this article. Saying that less than 40% of the population in Thai are fluent in Thai is outlandish. And no, it’s 70 million. Get your facts straight.
French is certainly not #2 influential in the world I live in. I would have to say English #1 and Chinese #2. In Science and business, Chinese is incredibly important. #3 would be Spanish.
What were your sources for this article? I wonder about the accuracy of some items. For example, many of the people who live on the island of Java do not speak any Javanese. Sundanese is a major language there, with an estimated 27 million speakers.
Sundanese is a major language there but consider how many people live on the island of Java – 135 million. 27 million Sundanese speakers is miniscule compared to the number that speak Javanese (which is spoken in other parts of Indonesia as well). At the end of the day, Javanese has many more speakers and is much more internationalized.
hurrayyyyyyyyyyyy tamil……..over 5000 years old,,,,,,,,,only 5 languages has same like this great tamil…….
Classical Languages in the world :
1. Sumerian 2. Egyptian 3. Babylonian
4. Hebrew 5. Chinese 6. Greek 7. Latin 8. Sanskrit 9. Tamil
* Though the first three languages existed along with all 9, only the last 6 languages are called as Worlds Classical languages.
* Only Chinese and Tamil are used by masses now.
Swahili number 13? This is awesome!
¿Español en 3º? Sorprendente!!
Bangla 17th? Surprising!