What is the fastest growing language?

I love playing around with data. Languages are fascinating in this respect, you can study everything from speaker numbers (both native and total) to the size and shape of language family trees. Most recently, I've been crunching some numbers to look at growing languages. More specifically, the fastest growing languages in the world.

As with all things data-based, there are various ways to approach this. Calculating the speed at which the language landscape has changed over the past century will likely produce different results than calculating it over the past 20 years. So I'm going to approach this from a few different angles, and see if we can find a clear winner.

Quick summary: the ten fastest growing languages

Based on available data across multiple metrics, these ten languages are among the fastest growing today: English, Portuguese, Arabic, Urdu, Indonesian, Chinese (Mandarin), Hindi, Korean, Spanish, and French. Each earns its place on the list for different reasons, which I'll break down below.

In this article:

1. Population growth and language speaker numbers
2. Projections: what will be the most spoken language in 2050?
3. The 10 fastest growing languages in the world
4. What language growth means for translation and business
5. Frequently asked questions

Population growth and language speaker numbers

The global population is still growing, but more slowly than before. Fertility decline has substantially slowed global growth rates, from a peak of 2.3% in 1963 to just 0.8% in 2024. The world reached approximately 8.2 billion people by 2025, and that growth rate is expected to continue declining.

This deceleration matters when thinking about language growth. More people alive means more speakers of all languages, in aggregate. But the geographic distribution of that growth is highly uneven, and that unevenness is one of the most important drivers of which languages are growing fastest.

In 1970, the global population totalled 3.7 billion; it has more than doubled since then. An increase of that scale leads to some fast-growing languages even if every person only spoke one tongue. Yet some 43% of the global population is bilingual and 13% is trilingual, which further contributes to the rate at which languages grow.

What this doesn't mean is that all languages are growing at the same rate. Quite the opposite. Everything from political pressures to religious influence to digital access can impact the pace at which languages grow. Some are actively repressed, while others are dying out as smaller communities are absorbed into dominant linguistic cultures. A language dies off every 40 days, with the vast majority of endangered languages found in indigenous communities. At the same time, a handful of major languages are growing rapidly to serve as lingua francas across vast regions. For a broader view of how many languages exist and how many are at risk, the Tomedes piece on how many languages exist today is worth reading.

Projections: what will be the most spoken language in 2050?

We can't accurately predict what will happen to the global language landscape over the coming decades, there are too many variables. What we can do is extrapolate from the demographic and economic data we have.

Using the engco model of language forecasting, results suggest the top five languages in 2050 will be Chinese, Spanish, English, Hindi-Urdu, and Arabic. A 2014 projection by investment bank Natixis suggested French might top the list by 2050, based largely on its growth across sub-Saharan Africa — a region with some of the fastest population growth rates in the world. A 15-year study by linguist Ulrich Ammon, meanwhile, suggested English, Chinese, Spanish, and French all warrant close attention.

Looking further ahead, it seems likely that the languages that have come to dominate over the past century will continue to matter. Fast-forward to 2100 and we are still likely to hear English, Mandarin, Spanish, and Hindi being spoken widely around the globe. Whether any of them will be the single fastest growing language by then is harder to say, particularly as technology continues to reshape how languages spread and persist.

The 10 fastest growing languages in the world

How we measure language growth matters enormously. The languages that have gained the most speakers in absolute terms over the past decade are not the same as those that have grown fastest in percentage terms. I'm going to look at both.

1. English

If we measure raw increases in speaker numbers, English is the fastest growing language — and has been over the past 10, 50, and 100 years.

English is the most spoken language in 2025 with 1.5 billion total speakers. About 25% (390 million) speak English as a first language, but a staggering 1.1 billion use it as their second language.

Between 2011 and 2021, the number of English speakers increased from around 1.05 billion to 1.3 billion — a rise of nearly 246 million in a single decade, far more than any other language. Looking back over the past 50 years paints a similar picture. English added over 500 million speakers between 1971 and 2021, while Chinese added around 277 million and Hindi around 187 million.

In 2024, English was the most popular language studied around the world on Duolingo, earning the top spot in more countries than ever before (135), up more than 10% compared to the previous year. The 2025 Duolingo Language Report pushed that figure further: English became the number one language to study in 154 countries, an increase of 14% over 2024.

In terms of speaker numbers, English is clearly the fastest growing language over the past 100 years, rising from roughly 406 million speakers in 1921 to 1.5 billion today.

2. Portuguese

Did you expect to see Portuguese topping a growth list? Spoken mainly in Brazil but also in Portugal, Mozambique, Angola, and elsewhere, Portuguese has grown from around 65 million speakers in 1921 to approximately 264 million today. That works out as growth of around 306% over the past century.

Considered by this metric, Portuguese has grown faster than English, Chinese, Hindi, Spanish, French, Arabic, Bengali, and Russian. Brazil's population (and the continuing growth of African Portuguese-speaking nations including Angola and Mozambique) drives much of this.

On Duolingo, Portuguese entered the global top 10 most studied languages in 2023, pushing Russian from the list. Connecting with people (23%) and preparing for travel (18%) are the top reasons learners choose Portuguese, and 72% of new Portuguese learners are under 30. 

3. Arabic

Arabic deserves a prominent mention here. Modern Arabic has grown from around 74 million speakers in 1921 to approximately 332 million today — an increase of roughly 348%, outpacing English's 270% growth over the same century.

Standard Arabic is the official language in 24 countries across the Middle East and North Africa, and the region's sustained population growth means this trajectory is likely to continue. The religious significance of Classical Arabic (as the language of the Quran) also sustains strong demand for Arabic learning and translation globally, independent of native speaker growth.

4. Urdu

When viewed in terms of rate of increase, the fastest growing language over the past 50 years is Urdu. Speaker numbers have risen from around 113 million in 1971 to approximately 238–246 million today. That is an increase of more than 95% — a growth rate which eclipses English, Chinese, Hindi, Spanish, French, Arabic, Bengali, Russian, Portuguese, Indonesian, German, and Japanese over the same period.

Looking at just the past decade, Urdu also leads. Its total speaker numbers grew by approximately 39% between 2011 and 2021. Urdu's 246 million users span Pakistan, India, and a far-flung diaspora. 

5. Indonesian

The rapid growth of Indonesia's population means that Bahasa Indonesia has been one of the fastest growing languages in the world over the past 50 years. Speaker numbers in 1971 stood at 127,635,615. By 2021, that number had grown to 228,241,973 speakers — and only Urdu grew faster over the same time period.

The same is true over the past decade. While Urdu grew by around 39% in the decade to 2021, Indonesian came in second with growth of approximately 25%. Indonesia is also the world's fourth most populous country, which means the demographic engine behind Indonesian's growth remains substantial. For more on the language's fascinating structure and history, read Tomedes' deep dive on the Indonesian language.

6. Chinese (Mandarin)

English aside, Mandarin Chinese has grown fastest in absolute speaker numbers over the past 10, 50, and 100 years.

Mandarin has 1.2 billion speakers, but the first and second language split is reversed compared to English — the vast majority are native speakers. Between 2011 and 2021, the number of Chinese speakers increased by approximately 70 million in a single decade. Over the past 50 years, the figure rises to around 277 million additional speakers, while the past century has seen an increase of roughly 551 million.

China's economic and geopolitical influence has made Mandarin an increasingly important language for business, technology, and diplomacy — driving second-language learning beyond the Chinese-speaking world.

7. Hindi

With 345 million native speakers and a total of 609 million speakers, Hindi is the third most spoken language globally.

In the past decade, Hindi came very close to matching Chinese's raw growth. While Chinese speakers increased by approximately 70 million between 2011 and 2021, Hindi speakers increased by around 65 million. In percentage terms, Hindi grew faster than Chinese over the same decade (11% versus 7%) though neither came close to Urdu's 39% increase.

Hindi secured a spot in the Duolingo global top 10 in 2024, with over 8.4 million active learners globally, reflecting its rising cultural and linguistic significance beyond India.

8. Korean

Korean merits inclusion here for a reason that has nothing to do with native speaker numbers: it is one of the fastest growing languages by learner demand.

In 2025, new Japanese and Korean courses became available to speakers of more than 20 languages on Duolingo (beyond the previous English, Japanese, and Chinese options) and so many learners enrolled that the global language ranking shifted. Korean jumped to number six in Duolingo's global language rankings in 2023, with young people around the world driving a growing interest in all Asian languages, especially Korean.

K-pop, K-drama, and Korean cinema have built a self-sustaining learner base that continues to grow independent of geography. In India alone, Korean learning on Duolingo grew by 75% in a single year.

9. Spanish

In 2024, Spanish is spoken by approximately 560 million people, the vast majority of whom are native speakers — fewer than one in seven learned it as a second language.

At the regional level, Spanish is particularly fast-growing in the United States. Hispanics are the country's fastest-growing demographic. Between 1980 and 2015, the number of Spanish speakers in the US nearly quadrupled, rising from around 11 million to more than 41 million. The proportion of the US population that speaks Spanish grew from 5% to 13% over the same period.

It is worth noting the distinction between language growth and population movement. When Spanish-speaking families migrate from Latin America to the United States, this appears in US data as Spanish growth — but globally, it may simply represent an existing speaker moving location rather than a new speaker being added. Both matter for business purposes; the distinction matters for interpreting the data correctly.

10. French

For growing languages at a regional level, French also deserves a place on this list. The language landscape of sub-Saharan Africa is shifting rapidly toward French. At present, around 44% of the world's total French-speaking population lives in sub-Saharan Africa — and with some projections suggesting that figure could approach 85% by 2050, driven by Africa's sustained demographic growth, French is positioned for significant absolute growth over the coming decades.

French ranks as the sixth most spoken language in the world by total speakers, and its role as an official language across a broad set of international organisations (including the UN, EU, and African Union) sustains consistent demand for French translation and localization regardless of regional trends.

What language growth means for translation and business

The pace of change in the global language landscape has clear implications for any business operating across borders.

Understanding which languages are growing (and why) helps inform decisions about which markets to prioritise, which language pairs to build capability in, and how to allocate localization budgets over a multi-year horizon. The rise of Urdu, Indonesian, and Hindi as some of the fastest-growing languages by percentage is not just a demographic footnote; it reflects economic growth trajectories in South and Southeast Asia that will create significant commercial opportunities in those markets over the next two decades.

At the same time, the flip side of language growth deserves attention. At current rates, 90% of the world's languages could disappear over the next 100 years, with over 88 million people currently speaking endangered languages. The concentration of speakers into a small number of dominant languages (particularly English, Mandarin, Spanish, and Hindi) is happening partly at the expense of thousands of smaller languages.

For businesses, this dual dynamic means that investing in translation and localization for major growing languages is increasingly important, while the documentation and preservation of minority languages presents a separate and equally pressing need. Tomedes provides translation services and localization services across 270+ languages, including many of the fastest-growing markets covered in this analysis.

FAQs

Q: What is the fastest growing language in the world?
A: It depends on how you measure it. By raw increase in total speakers over the past century, English leads by a wide margin — growing from around 406 million speakers in 1921 to 1.5 billion today. By percentage growth over the past 50 years, Urdu leads, having grown by over 95% between 1971 and 2021. By percentage growth over the past decade, Urdu again leads at approximately 39%, followed by Indonesian at 25%.

Q: What will be the most spoken language in 2050?
A: Projections vary widely. The engco model of language forecasting suggests the top five in 2050 will be Chinese, Spanish, English, Hindi-Urdu, and Arabic. A 2014 Natixis study projected French based on its growth across Africa. Most linguists and demographers expect English, Mandarin, Spanish, and Hindi to remain dominant, though Africa's demographic trajectory (and the languages spoken there) will be a major factor.

Q: Why is Urdu one of the fastest growing languages?
A: Urdu has grown faster than any other major language in percentage terms over the past 50 years, driven by population growth in Pakistan and India, Urdu's status as an official language of Pakistan, and a large and growing diaspora. Its close mutual intelligibility with Hindi means its practical reach is even wider than speaker numbers alone suggest.

Q: Why is Korean growing so fast as a learned language?
A: Korean's growth as a learned language is almost entirely driven by cultural influence — K-pop, K-drama, and Korean cinema have built a self-sustaining global learner base. Duolingo data consistently shows Korean among the fastest-rising languages in markets with no geographic proximity to the Korean peninsula, including Latin America, South Asia, and Western Europe.

Q: What languages are dying out?
A: The counterpoint to language growth is language loss. According to Ethnologue, a language dies off approximately every 40 days. The vast majority of endangered languages are indigenous, concentrated in Oceania, the Americas, and parts of Asia. At current rates, an estimated 90% of the world's approximately 7,000 languages could disappear within the next 100 years — a loss that carries irreplaceable cultural and cognitive knowledge.

Q: What are the fastest growing languages for business translation?
A: The languages with the greatest business translation demand reflect a combination of existing major markets and emerging growth regions. Mandarin, Spanish, Arabic, and Portuguese cover the largest current markets. Hindi, Urdu, Indonesian, and Bengali are the fastest-growing in terms of population and economic trajectory — and represent the next tier of demand for organisations building out their global translation capacity.

Was your language included, or did something surprise you? For professional translation and localization in any of these growing languages, contact Tomedes — available 24/7 with support in over 270 languages.