In this article, we will be covering the 50 most spoken languages in the world. If you want to skip our analysis, you can go directly to the 20 Most Spoken Languages in the World.
Learning New Languages
In a world so connected, language is the key to communication between people. Approximately 7,118 living languages are spoken by the 8 billion people on the planet. Some of them, especially English and Mandarin Chinese, have gained an institutional status globally whilst others are spoken in communities and are recognized as stable languages.
Languages are vectors of thoughts, a means to preserve culture and a tool to understand and learn. Learning new languages for trade, travel, education, military strategies, and religious purposes has been a norm throughout history. In today’s world, while all of the above reasons are still valid, career advancement and personal enrichment have become reasons to learn new languages. This has presented an avenue for companies like Duolingo Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL), Coursera Inc. (NYSE:COUR) and Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META) to expand into and provide platforms for people to learn new languages from the ease of their homes. Real-time translation tools have allowed organizations to expand into international markets by maintaining cross-lingual communication.
Duolingo Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL) is an industrial leader in the arena of developing interactive tools to teach languages with courses in over 40 languages and 500 million registered users. The company has a freemium business model with free access to the basic features its platform offers. On September 6, Duolingo Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL) launched a new gamified tool for users to learn all 3 Japanese writing systems. Earlier this year, Duolingo Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL) introduced ‘Duolingo Max’ in collaboration with OpenAI leveraging the use of artificial intelligence to provide personalized language lessons.
Coursera Inc. (NYSE:COUR) is an online learning platform that offers professional degrees and courses, online, to anyone, anywhere in the world. It also provides comprehensive courses by professors from leading universities to learn new languages. The platform has courses for over 40 languages. On July 27, the company reported earnings for the fiscal second quarter of 2023 in which it generated a revenue of $153.70 million, up 23.20% year over year.
The Machine Translation Industry: An Analysis
Machine translation is the use of artificial intelligence to translate speech and text from one language to another. According to a report by Global Market Insights published in August 2023, the machine translation market was valued at $982.2 million in 2022. The industry is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 22.8% and reach $7.57 billion by 2032.
Over 38% of the global revenue share of the machine translation market was held by North America in 2022. A major contributing factor to this is the presence of companies with a diverse clientele and partners who speak various languages. Swift translation of speech and text helps the multicultural business landscape thrive.
AI-based real-time communication is a gift of technological advancements, enabling communication across languages. Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META), on August 22, released an AI Model, Seamless M4T, capable of translating and transcribing speech in over 100 languages. This real-time translation is leveraged by the healthcare industry to provide care to patients from diverse ethnic backgrounds. In 2022, healthcare held 20% of the machine translation market share, application-wise.
An innovative artificial intelligence company, Moveworks, is making leaps in the machine translation market. On February 16, Moveworks launched an AI platform that provides real-time language translation for over 100 languages. The bot uses input from any language and translates it into a language understandable to its employees.
There is a growing need for machine translation for communication between organizations which drives investments in the sector. Increasing e-commerce requires cost-efficient, high-speed translation services. This allows businesses to expand into new markets with marketing in relevant languages. High-speed translation becomes essential for companies that market their products internationally through social media. With vast amounts of content being generated on a daily basis, these organizations require accurate and efficient translation. These reasons become growth drivers for investments in the machine translation industry. With that, let’s take a look at the 50 most spoken languages in the world.
50 Most Spoken Languages in the World
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Our Methodology
To come up with the 50 most spoken languages in the world, we sourced our data from Ethnologue. We carried out a manual search of the catalogue to tabulate the 50 most spoken languages globally. The metric we used is the number of speakers of a given language, which included both native and non-native speakers. We have ranked the most spoken languages in the world in ascending order of the total number of speakers they have.
50 Most Spoken Languages in the World
50. Malayalam
Total Number of Speakers: 37.4 million
Malayalam is used by 37.4 million people and is an official language in parts of India where it is spoken. It belongs to the Dravidian language family.
Some of the top companies innovating in the language teaching space include Duolingo Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL), Coursera Inc. (NYSE:COUR), and Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META).
49. Xiang Chinese
Total Number of Speakers: 38.1 million
Xiang Chinese is spoken by 38.1 million people and is an indigenous language of China.
48. Moroccan-spoken Arabic
Total Number of Speakers: 39.2 million
Originating in Morocco and the Western Sahara region, Moroccan-spoken Arabic is spoken by 39.2 million people.
47. Odia
Total Number of Speakers: 39.8 million
Odia is spoken by 39.8 million people in parts of India, primarily.
46. Lingala
Total Number of Speakers: 40.3 million
Lingala is used by 40.3 million people and is a major means of communication in Congo.
45. Polish
Total Number of Speakers: 40.4 million
With 40.6 million people who speak Polish, it ranks 45th on our list of the 50 most spoken languages in the world. It is the official national language of Poland.
44. Algerian-spoken Arabic
Total Number of Speakers: 41.4 million
Algerian-spoken Arabic originated in Algeria and is spoken by 41.4 million people across the globe.
43. Sudanese-spoken Arabic
Total Number of Speakers: 42.4 million
Sudanese Spoken Arabic is used by 42.4 million people for communication in Sudan and South Sudan, primarily.
42. Burmese
Total Number of Speakers: 43 million
Used by 43 million people globally, Burmese is the official national language of Myanmar.
41. Hakka Chinese
Total Number of Speakers: 44.3 million
Hakka Chinese is used by 44.3 million people across the globe.
40. Yoruba
Total Number of Speakers: 45.9 million
Yoruba is spoken in parts of Nigeria, primarily, and has 45.9 million users across the globe.
39. Levantine Arabic
Total Number of Speakers: 47.6 million
Belonging to the Afro-Asiatic language family, Levantine Arabic is used by 47.6 people globally. It is a means of communication in countries like Syria, Israel, Palestine, Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan.
38. Jinyu Chinese
Total Number of Speakers: 48 million
Jinyu Chinese is an indigenous language spoken by 48 million people in China, primarily.
37. Min Nan Chinese
Total Number of Speakers: 50.5 million
Min Nan Chinese is a Chinese macrolanguage spoken by 50.5 million people across the globe.
36. Eastern Punjabi
Total Number of Speakers: 52.1 million
Eastern Punjabi is spoken by 52.1 million people in parts of India, primarily.
35. Bhojpuri
Total Number of Speakers: 52.5 million
Bhojpuri is spoken by 52.5 million people across the globe but is mainly used in India and Nepal.
34. Amharic
Total Number of Speakers: 57 million
Amharic is the official national language of Ethiopia and is used by 57 million people across the globe.
33. Kannada
Total Number of Speakers: 58.7 million
Kannada is the official language in parts of India and is spoken by 58.7 million people, across the globe. Kannada belongs to the Dravidian language family.
32. Thai
Total Number of Speakers: 62.1 million
Thai is spoken by 60.8 million people in the world. It belongs to the Kra-Dai language family and is the official national language of Thailand.
31. Gujarati
Total Number of Speakers: 62.1 million
With 62.1 million users Gujrati ranks 31st on the list of 50 most spoken languages globally.
30. Western Punjabi
Total Number of Speakers: 66.7 million
Western Punjabi is spoken by 66.7 million people and is an indigenous language of Pakistan and India.
29. Italian
Total Number of Speakers: 67.9 million
Italian is spoken by 67.9 million people in the world and is the official national language of Italy.
28. Javanese
Total Number of Speakers: 68.3 million
Javanese is spoken by 68.3 million people and is an indigenous language of Indonesia.
27. Swahili
Total Number of Speakers: 71.6 million
Swahili is the official language of Tanzania and belongs to the Niger-Congo language family. It has 71.6 million users worldwide.
26. Hausa
Total Number of Speakers: 78.5 million
Hausa is spoken by 78.5 million people worldwide and is the official language in the parts of Nigeria where it is spoken.
25. Iranian Persian
Total Number of Speakers: 78.6 million
Also known as Farsi, Iranian Persian is the official national language of Iran and is spoken by 78.6 million people worldwide.
24. Korean
Total Number of Speakers: 81.7 million
Korean has 81.7 million users and is the official national language of South Korea. According to a report by Duolingo, it was the 7th most popular language among learners in 2022, thanks to the BTS Pop culture.
23. Tagalog
Total Number of Speakers: 83.1 million
Tagalog is used by 83.1 million people in the world. It originated in the Philippines and belongs to the Austronesian language family.
22. Wu Chinese
Total Number of Speakers: 83.4 million
Wu Chinese is spoken by 83.4 million people worldwide and is a stable indigenous language of China.
21. Vietnamese
Total Number of Speakers: 85.8 million
Vietnamese is the official national language of Vietnam and is spoken by 85.8 million people in the world. It belongs to the Austro-Asiatic language family.
If you want to learn Vietnamese, you can check out language learning courses offered by Duolingo Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOL) and Coursera Inc. (NYSE:COUR) or you can experiment with Meta Platforms Inc.'s (NASDAQ:META) latest AI-based language translator, the Seamless M4T.
