Moa
What is the second most spoken language in Europe?

English is spoken in almost entire world, but what about in Europe? What is the second most spoken language in Europe?

May 25, 2015 8:56 PM
Comments · 14
4

In Europe, there are more native speakers of German than English.

 

There are over 82 million people in Germany, plus another 15 million or so German speakers in Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein. So, with not far off 100 million speakers, German is the language which has by far the most native speakers within Europe 'proper' (not counting Russia)  There are more than twice as many German speakers than Spanish speakers, for example. 

May 25, 2015
2

De nada, Moa. But it's worth remembering that although there are fewer <em>native</em> English speakers in Europe than there are <em>native</em> German speakers, it is still the case that English is  the most spoken language across the continent. This is because English is by far the major <em>second language.</em> A very large number of people in the Netherlands and Scandinavia (Swedes, Danes, Norwegians, Finns) speak excellent English, often at native or near-native level, as do many Germans. The next most useful <em></em>second language is probably French. French is taught as a foreign language in most countries in Europe, and most educated British people know at least some French.

May 26, 2015
2

I'm still not clear what you mean. Do you mean the most popular language to learn as a second language in different countries? Or total speakers of a language?

If you mean total speakers my guess is it would be Russian, but Russian is not taught to any great degree in countries in Western Europe to my knowledge. This is only my best estimate, but personally, I think there will be more people who speak German in Europe than Spanish.

Anyway it's very hard to say. One thing I can tell you is that the most popular foreign languages to learn in the UK are French, Spanish and German, but given we are a notoriously monolingual country I'm not sure how useful that is.

May 25, 2015
2

You mean as a native language or not? Because English isn't the most spoken native language in Europe. If you include Russia as part of Europe then Russian will be the most spoken language in Europe, if not German. 

 

 

May 25, 2015
2

It begins with "Spa" and finish with "nish".

May 25, 2015
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