Most Used Languages on the Internet
One of the key steps for brands to increase their sales is to connect with their buyers effectively. But before they can appeal to their emotions, they need to create content that matches their interests and needs, starting with choosing the right language.
Here’s a breakdown of the most used languages on the internet.
What is the most used language on the internet?
According to a study, English dominates the internet as the most common language for web content. Nearly three out of every five websites use English, which reflects its global popularity as the language spoken by 18.1% of the world’s population.
The study also shows that no other language comes close to English in terms of online usage. This is so much so that its share of 58.8% is more than double the combined shares of the other nine languages featured on this list.
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Russian is the second most used language on the internet. 5.3% of websites feature content in Russian, which is the official language of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia. In comparison, it is spoken by 3.2% of the world's population.
Spanish, a language spoken by 60% of people living in Latin America and 6.8% of the global population, is in third place, with 4.3%. French and German are the fourth and fifth most used languages on the internet. Each is used by 3.7% of websites and spoken by around 1.6% of the global population.
Japanese is in sixth place—3% of websites have content in the East Asian language, which is spoken by 1.6% of people worldwide. This is followed by Turkish and Persian, with shares of 2.8% and 2.3%, respectively.
Chinese ranks ninth among the most common languages on the internet, with 1.7% of websites using it. This is surprisingly low, given that almost 19% of the world’s population speaks Chinese. Italian is the 10th most used language on the internet, appearing on 1.6% of websites.
Together, the 10 most common languages on the internet have a market share totaling 87.2%. In other words, nearly nine out of every 10 websites feature content in any of these 10 languages.