World Languages: Some Interesting Facts
I came across some interesting facts about world languages and the how many of them are represented on the Internet.
- There are 6,912 living languages spoken in the world today.
- 36 of these languages make up about 77% of the world’s population.
- There are 311 languages spoken in the United States.
- There are over twice as many people in the world who speak Mandarin Chinese as their primary language over those who speak English as their primary language.
- Arabic is the fastest growing language on the internet. It is growing at a rate of 930% (vs. 131% for English)!
- Chinese, French, Spanish and Portuguese, as Internet languages are all growing at rates 2-3 times faster than English.
- Other world languages (excluding: English, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, German, French, Portuguese, Korean, Italian, Arabic) make up over 18% of the Internet users, and the percentage of those users on the internet is growing at a rate of over 430%!
From: Languages of the World