Can you imagine how many languages are there in the world? Though it is difficult to say precisely, the count of spoken languages are near about 7000.
But Out of that figure, around 40 percent of languages are now endangered, and they have less than 1000 native speakers. Only 23 languages have covered half of the world population.
A large number of languages do not have their script. For Example, English is one of the most spoken languages globally, but the English language does not have its script. ‘Roman’ script is used to write the English language. Some languages are only verbal, they dont have any existing written form, and it exists in a specific region or among specific groups.
These are called ‘dialect.’ Some languages are already have vanished from the earth.
Let us discuss the top 10 most spoken languages in the world.
- Mandarin Chinese:
Mandarin Chinese has the highest speaker in the world. It is the official language of China and Singapore. This language has about 897 million native speakers, and about 139 million people can speak it. - English:
A population of around 371 million uses the English language as their mother tongue, and approximately 611 million people in the world can speak English. English is the prime language for countries like the UK, USA, and some other countries. Including India, English is recognized as the official language of many other countries. - Hindi:
Hindi is the third most spoken language in the world, with nearly 329 million native speakers. Apart from this, about 215 million people in the world can speak Hindi. Hindi is used as an official language in India and Pakistan. - Spanish:
The Spanish language is in the fourth position according to the number of speakers in the world. It is the mother tongue for nearly 436 million people in the world. About 91 million people can speak Spanish as an additional language. This is the primary language for Spain, but it is used in USA, Mexico, and some Latin American nations. - Arabic:
Near about 290 million people in the world speak Arabic as a native language. About 132 million people can speak this language. Arabic is the primary language of some countries of the Middle East and the northern part of Africa. - Malay:
Malay is the official language of Asian countries like Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, etc. This is the mother tongue of about 77 million people worldwide, and nearly 204 million people can speak Malay as their second or third language. - Russian:
Russia is the world’s largest nation and the official language of this nation. Russian also has a large number of speakers globally. It is 7th most spoken language in the world. Russian is the official language not only in present Russia but also in Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan. Russian is the mother tongue of about 153 million people in the world, and nearly 113 million people can speak this language. - Bengali:
The 8th most spoken language in the world is Bengali. About 242 million people use Bengali as their mother tongue. Almost 19 million people can speak this language. Bengali is the official language of Bangladesh and some of the Indian states. - Portuguese:
European language Portuguese is the 9th most spoken language with about 218 million native speakers. About 11 million people in the world can speak this language. Around ten countries, including Portugal and Brazil, use this as the official language. - French:
With about 76 million native speakers in the world, French is the tenth most spoken language. About 153 million people use this as their one of associate language. French is the official language of about 28 countries like France, Canada, Switzerland, Belgium, some countries of South America and Africa, etc.
There are more languages there in the world and many people who use those languages to communicate with each other. We can say about Marathi, Telugu, Punjabi, Yue Chinese, Trukese, Korean, German, Vietnamese, Tamil, Urdu, and many more. It can be mentioned that a lot of highly spoken languages are Indian.
We can see mostly spoken languages in two ways.
The most spoken Asian languages are the primary language of such countries where the population is high—Mandarin Chinese in China, Hindi in India, etc.
On the other hand, English, Spanish, Portuguese, French are the most spoken europian language which spread to other countries in the colonial period.