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All World Languages in One Visualization

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This infographic was originally published in scmp.com

Infographic: A World of Languages

All World Languages, By Native Speakers

View a high resolution version of today’s graphic by clicking here.

Languages provide a window into culture and history. They’re also a unique way to map the world – not through landmasses or geopolitical borders, but through mother tongues.

The Tower of Babel

Today’s infographic from Alberto Lucas Lopez condenses the 7,102 known living languages today into a stunning visualization, with individual colors representing each world region.

Only 23 languages are spoken by at least 50 million native speakers. What’s more, over half the planet speaks at least one of these 23 languages.

Chinese dominates as a macrolanguage, but it’s important to note that it consists of numerous languages. Mandarin, Yue (including Cantonese), Min, Wu, and Hakka cover over 200 individual dialects, which vary further by geographic location.

CountryNative Chinese speakers (millions)
🇨🇳 China1,152.0
🇹🇼 Taiwan21.8
🇭🇰 Hong Kong SAR6.5
🇲🇾 Malaysia5.1
🇸🇬 Singapore1.8
🇹🇭 Thailand1.2
🇻🇳 Vietnam0.9
🇵🇭 Philippines0.7
🇲🇲 Myanmar0.5
🇲🇴 Macau SAR0.5
Other6.0
Total1,197 million

Chinese is one of the most challenging languages for English speakers to pick up, in part due its completely unfamiliar scripts. You’d have to know at least 3,000 characters to be able to read a newspaper, a far cry from memorizing the A-Z alphabet.

Spanglish Takes Over

After Chinese, the languages of Spanish and English sit in second and third place in terms of global popularity. The rapid proliferation of these languages can be traced back to the history of Spanish conquistadors in the Americas, and British colonies around the world.

Animation: Map of Colonization (1492 – 2008):
Colonization Map

Today, Spanish has 399 million native speakers, but these are mostly concentrated in Latin America. English has 335 million native speakers under its belt, with a widespread reach all over the globe.

Two Worlds, One Family

While the visualization makes all the world languages seem disparate, this linguistic family tree shows how they grew from a common root. It also explains how languages can evolve and branch out over time.

Language Tree

Created by Minna Sundberg. Full version.

This linguistic tree also includes many languages that are not on the large visualization of 23 mother tongues. Some of them might be considered endangered or at risk today, such as Catalan or Welsh. However, with globalization, a few interesting linguistic trends are arising.

1. Language revival
Certain enclaves of marginalized languages are being preserved out of pride for the traditional and cultural histories attached.

While Catalan was once banned, its rebirth is a key marker of identity in Barcelona. More than 150 universities teach Catalan worldwide. In the case of Welsh, a mammoth university project plans to make sure it does not die out. Researchers are compiling ten million Welsh words to preserve the past, present, and future of the language.

2. Language forecast
At this point in time, English is the lingua franca – adopted as a common language among speakers with different mother tongues. However, this status might soon be fuzzier as demographic trends continue.

The rise of China is an obvious one to consider. As China continues to increase its economic might and influence, its languages will proliferate as well.

At the same time, 26 African countries are projected to double their current size, many of which speak French as a first language. One study by investment bank Natixis suggests that Africa’s growth may well bring French to the forefront – making it the most-spoken language by 2050.

Could French provide a certain je ne sais quoi that no other world language can quite replace?

This post was first published in 2018. We have since updated it, adding in new content for 2021.

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Demographics

Mapped: Population Growth by Region (1900-2050F)

In this visualization, we map the populations of major regions at three different points in time: 1900, 2000, and 2050 (forecasted).

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Map of Population Growth by Region

Mapping Population Growth by Region

This was originally posted on our Voronoi app. Download the app for free on iOS or Android and discover incredible data-driven charts from a variety of trusted sources.

In fewer than 50 years, the world population has doubled in size, jumping from 4 to 8 billion.

In this visualization, we map the populations of major regions at three different points in time: 1900, 2000, and 2050 (forecasted). Figures come from Our World in Data as of March 2023, using the United Nations medium-fertility scenario.

 

 

Population by Continent (1900-2050F)

Asia was the biggest driver of global population growth over the course of the 20th century. In fact, the continent’s population grew by 2.8 billion people from 1900 to 2000, compared to just 680 million from the second on our list, Africa.

Region190020002050F
Asia931,021,4183,735,089,7755,291,555,919
Africa138,752,199818,952,3742,485,135,689
Europe406,610,221727,917,165704,398,730
North America104,231,973486,364,446679,488,449
South America41,330,704349,634,344491,078,697
Oceania5,936,61531,223,13357,834,753
World 🌐1,627,883,1306,149,181,2379,709,492,237

China was the main source of Asia’s population expansion, though its population growth has slowed in recent years. That’s why in 2023, India surpassed China to become the world’s most populous country.

Southeast Asian countries like the Philippines and Indonesia have also been big drivers of Asia’s population boom to this point.

The Future: Africa to Hit 2.5 Billion by 2050

Under the UN’s medium-fertility scenario (all countries converge at a birthrate of 1.85 children per woman by 2050), Africa will solidify its place as the world’s second most populous region.

Three countries—Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Egypt—will account for roughly 30% of that 2.5 billion population figure.

Meanwhile, both North America and South America are expected to see a slowdown in population growth, while Europe is the only region that will shrink by 2050.

A century ago, Europe’s population was close to 30% of the world total. Today, that figure stands at less than 10%.

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