Most spoken language
Who
Chinese
What
1,311,000,000 people
Where
China ()
When
2019

According to Ethnologue.com, the most spoken language in the world in 2019 is Chinese, with 1,311,000,000 first-language speakers, which is listed as an official language in 39 countries. In second place is Spanish, with 460 million speakers across 31 countries. And third is English, with 379 million speakers in 137 countries.


The different Chinese dialects have the following number of first-language speakers:

  • Chinese, Mandarin: 918 millions
  • Chinese, Wu : 81.4 millions
  • Chinese, Yue : 73.1 millions
  • Chinese, Min Nan : 50.1 millions
  • Chinese, Hakka : 48.2 millions
  • Chinese, Jinyu : 46.9 millions
  • Chinese, Xiang : 37.3 millions
  • Chinese, Gan : 22.1 millions
  • Chinese, Min Bei : 11 millions
  • Chinese, Min Dong : 10.3 millions
  • Chinese, Huizhou : 4.60 millions
  • Chinese, Min Zhong : 3.53 millions
  • Chinese, Pu-Xian : 2.57 millions