Close to 100 million people speak German as their mother tongue, and around 50 to 60 million more speak it as a second or foreign language. Depending on how regional varieties are counted, the total lies between 130 and 155 million people, roughly 1.6 to 1.9 per cent of the world’s population.

Globe made of national flags above an outstretched hand — A globe with various country flags

Where German is an official language

German is the most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union. It is the official language of Germany, Austria and Liechtenstein, and one of the official languages of Switzerland, Luxembourg and Belgium. In Switzerland it shares that status with French, Italian and Romansh; in Luxembourg, with French and Luxembourgish. German also has regional status in South Tyrol in Italy and in southern Denmark.

Standard German is the form taught in schools across these countries and the one we teach in private German lessons in London and online German lessons. Alongside it live regional varieties such as Swiss German, Bavarian and Austrian German, which explains the wide range in speaker counts.

History and migration have left German-speaking communities further afield: in Poland, Czechia and Kazakhstan, in Brazil, Paraguay and Chile, and in Namibia. Interest in the language reaches further still. The Goethe-Institut counts more than 15 million people learning German as a foreign language worldwide.

German among the world’s languages

Around 7,000 languages are spoken today, most of them by very few people: more than half have fewer than 10,000 speakers. A small group covers most of humanity. Chinese, English, Spanish, Hindi, Arabic, Portuguese, Bengali and Russian each have more than 150 million speakers.

Papua New Guinea alone has more than 800 languages. Many of the world’s languages are under threat, especially those of indigenous peoples in Asia and the Americas.

Where German comes from

German belongs to the Indo-European family, whose languages stretch from Europe to the Indian subcontinent. Its Germanic branch began with speakers in southern Scandinavia and along the Baltic and North Sea coasts, who later moved west across the Rhine, east beyond the Vistula and south.

Old High German was spoken around a thousand years ago, Middle High German until about 1350 and Early New High German until about 1650, when New High German took over.

Is German hard to learn?

Less than its reputation suggests. Proto-Indo-European had three genders, three numbers (singular, dual and plural) and eight cases. Germanic cut the cases to six, and modern German has four. The dual has gone, leaving singular and plural. Only the three genders remain.

With well over 130 million speakers, most of them in Europe, that is reason enough to learn German.