Spanish is already the second mother tongue on the planet with a population of 500 million people (62% of the world’s population), a growth that gives “reason to be proud”, but cannot “mean complacency” because this increase cannot be united simply by demographic growth.

This is clear from the report “Spanish in the world 2023. Cervantes Institute Yearbook” – which in its 24th edition focuses on “Languages ​​for inclusion – presented this Monday at the Cervantes Institute in Madrid by its director, Luis García Montero, who said that “we have reason to be proud”, but this “cannot mean complacency”.

Of course, García Montero has clarified that “the demographics and cultural prestige of being Cervantes’ language alone are not enough”, and that is why the commitment to science and technology is “very fundamental”: “making Spanish the language of science and technology (…) science it was communicated well in Spanish,” he added.

Likewise, another goal – Carmen Pastor, academic director of Cervantes also added – is to bring Spanish to “regulated education”, and to ensure that second and third generations of Spaniards “preserve their mother tongue (heritage language)” in countries where this language is not an official language.

Today, nearly 500 million people (499,947,796) speak Spanish as their mother tongue (last year the number exceeded 496 million), representing 6.2% of the world’s population); and the total number of potential users of Spanish is approaching 600 million (students and people with skills).

Booming growth until 2071

The Cervantes Institute report – whose presentation was closed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares – provided positive data such as that the number of Spanish speakers will continue to grow in the next five decades, although their relative weight will decrease “progressively” there at the end of the century. “

Specifically, the number of potential users of Spanish will continue to increase in absolute terms until 2071, a year when the number of users will exceed 718 million people, with different levels of language mastery. That year was the peak of this trend throughout this century.

However, starting in 2071, the number of Spanish speakers is expected to decrease, reaching 693 million by the end of the 21st century.

Therefore, looking ahead, by 2060 the United States will be the second Spanish-speaking country in the world (after Mexico), with a population of 111 million.

Regarding Spanish as a language of study, currently more than 23 million students study Spanish as a foreign language (specifically, 23,035,198), almost 700,000 fewer than last year, although it is estimated that there is a large number of students who are not taken into account, especially in centers- private education center.

Among these countries, 80% are spread across the United States, European Union and Brazil. Out of these three regions, the UK is the most prominent country, with constant growth in student numbers (in part due to Brexit), and several other African countries. Sub-Saharan countries, especially in countries where French is an official or co-language language.

Spanish in institutions

In Europe, 76 million people are able to communicate in Spanish with varying levels of proficiency in the language; and Cervantes is the fourth language in the EU by number of native speakers (after German, Italian and French).

Likewise, in 19 of the 27 EU member states, Spanish is the language that citizens “most want” to learn as a second foreign language.

Meanwhile in the United States, the report explains, more than 62.5 million Americans (18.9% of the total population) are of Hispanic descent and 67.6% of them use Spanish in their family environment.

Only one-fifth of North American students (19.7%) study a foreign language, so the growth potential for Spanish is “huge.”

Spanish in science and the Internet

After English, Spanish is the second language in which the most scientific documents are published. In 2022, only 1.3% of articles will be in the database Science Network written in Spanish, while 94% used English.

Of course, 57% of scientific production in the Spanish-language field is currently carried out in Spain, far ahead of the second country, Mexico, with 14%.

In contrast to the situation of Spanish in the scientific field, the presence of our language on the Internet reflects that it is the third most used language on the web after English and Chinese.

Spanish is the second most used language on digital platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, Netflix, LinkedIn, Wikipedia or Instagram.

The number of Spanish-speaking Internet users has increased rapidly in the first two decades of the 21st century; Only Latin America and the Caribbean stated an increase of 2,858%.