What are the most spoken languages in the world?

Answer by  monkeyz (3150)

Numbers vary depending on where you look, or whether you count native and non-native speakers. The top five in one estimate include Mandarin Chinese (1.12 billion speakers), English (480 million), Spanish (320 million), Russian (285 million), and French (265 million).

Answer by  dhuoda (1431)

Mandarin Chinese has the most native speakers with an estimated 1,000 million. Spanish comes next with just less than 500 million. English is probably third in terms of native speakers, but it is the most widely spoken second language in the world and arguably has the biggest total number of speakers and the widest geographical range.

Answer by  Vivian (110)

Top would be Mandarin Chinese with 882 million speakers. English takes second place with approximately 380 million speakers--- though not all are native speakers. Third place is disputed but is between Arabic and Spanish, with anywhere from 206 to 422 million and 325 to 400 million speakers each, respectively.