Around the world there are a total of 7,102 known languages, in which 23 remain popular enough to be considered the world’s most spoken languages. Linguists considered them the mother tongue for over 50 million people, and the native tongue for over 4.1 billion people. Putting this into perspective, there are currently around 7.3 billion people living on the planet.
The circle below represents the 4.1 billion people around the world that speak one of the 23 most spoken languages. The chart further breaks down the numbers by the amount of people that speak a given language according to country.
Artist Alberto Lucas Lopez created this interesting infographic for the South China Morning Post.
Click this link to see a larger version and read all of the details.
The colors signify the interesting development of languages in different regions of the globe. You will also find different countries are placed throughout the chart, showing the language diversity as across the globe.
The most widely spoken language is Chinese, which is considered a macrolanguage that comprises different dialects such as Cantonese, Gan, Min Dong, Hakka, Jinyu, Min Bei, and more.
“The reason why English, French and Spanish are among the world’s most widespread languages has its roots in the imperial past of the nations where they originate.”
Although Chinese is the most widely used language, English remains the top language currently being learned with 1.5 billion learners. French is second with 82 million learners. Chinese is third with 30 million learners.
Photo Credits: lucasinfographic.com, Twitter, scmp.com