[Real] How much of the world speaks English?

Hey everyone, I wrote this a few months ago on a different sub and it got a lot of attention. This is pretty relevant to language learners as well so I thought I'd post it here. <br><br>---<br><br>Hey everyone. Been a resident of Taiwan for 5 years now. From the US originally.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>As an American, English is the only language I know. I often get asked about how hard it is to integrate into Taiwanese society. <br><br>Well, let’s just say I had a remarkable thing happen today. I went to a normal restaurant and the lady who served me was from Laos. The lady who served *her* was from Vietnam. The guys picking up the dishes were from Indonesia. <br><br>None of the people I interacted with at this restaurant could speak English. But all 4 people were immigrants from different countries. This is also happening in cities across the United States, but to a much lesser extent. Taiwanese cities are often immigrant cities.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>So I had to think about it, how much of the world *actually* speaks English? <br><br>*The United States and Canada speak English. That’s about 350 million people.*<br>*The UK and Ireland speak English. That’s about 70m people.*<br>*Australia and New Zealand, that’s another 30m.*<br>*South Africa, that’s 60m.*<br><br>I think the number is a little lower for India but *let’s just say 1/2 of Indians can function in English. That’s about 750 million people.*<br><br>*Singapore is 100% English-speaking.*<br>*Sweden, Denmark, Norway and the Netherlands all have English proficiency rates of 90% or higher. That’s 25m people.*<br>*Germany France and Italy each have English proficiency of 50% or higher. That’s another 150m.*<br>*Japan and South Korea are both at 30% English proficiency or higher. The numbers are similar for Eastern Europe.*<br><br>So we have added another 200m people in East Asia and another 150m in Europe for a total of 225m. <br><br>With 1.5 billion people in North America, Europe, Australia, Africa and Asia that can function in English, and 100 million immigrants from other parts of the world who live in English-speaking countries, that’s **1.6 billion people.** Or about 21% of the world that can function in English.<br><br>That leaves about 6 billion people in countries where less than 30% of the population can function in English. China with 1.4 billion people has English proficiency of <10%. Same with Brazil. Most countries in Latin America are <20% English-speaking. The Middle East is also <20%.<br><br>This is a bigger percentage of proficiency than Mandarin or Spanish or Arabic or Portuguese or French, all of which are commonly spoken native languages, but are far more limited in their international use. I couldn't find data for every country but the total number of people who can function in any of those languages is probably around 10-15%. <br><br>Consider that English proficiency isn't 100% in any of these countries. But it's also not 0% in any country either. The average English proficiency outside of English-speaking countries is probably around 10-30%. So the percentage of people that speak English worldwide is probably 25-30%. If we calculate it out, that means that 1.8-2.2 billion people in the world can function in English. Or roughly 25-28%.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>So, can we safely say that English is the world’s most widely spoken language? I think so.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>EDIT: I think I made a mistake in including the numbers for immigrants. The 1.6 billion number is accurate.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>To give a concrete example of why, I met a lady in Taiwan who was originally from China. She immigrated to Canada and learned English. In a few years, she moved back to Taiwan. She now speaks three languages. <br><br>When I met her I only knew that she was Chinese. So I would have counted her in the number of Chinese people not the number of English speakers. When she got her Canadian residency I would have counted her as part of the English-speaking number, even though she had already known English for several years before moving to Canada. She has since moved to Taiwan where she speaks Mandarin. I would still count her as part of Taiwan’s population. So that’s 3 different countries I could add her to the English-speaking number for. That’s not accurate.