What Are The Easiest Languages To Learn? : 17 Easiest Language To Learn For English Speakers
What Are The Easiest Languages To Learn? : 17 Easiest Language To Learn For English Speakers. Each language is full and complicated, and if you start from scratch (like a baby would), there’s no difference between Arabic, Latin, English, Mandarin or anything else. When you’re learning a second language, however, some will be easier than others.
Languages that are more closely related to English share certain qualities and characteristics that make them easier for English speakers to pick up. This includes things like sentence structure, vocabulary, tones and sounds, and writing system.
Contents
Why should we learn a new language?
Being multilingual makes you more employable. With a globalising economy, speaking a second language can help you land high-skill jobs in countries worldwide. A study showed that having a foreign language in your CV can increase your salary. It makes you just as qualified as those from Europe, a region in which some parts have 100% of students able to speak multiple languages.
Top Easiest language to learn for English & French speakers
- Spanish.
- Frisian
- Dutch
- Portuguese.
- Italian.
- Swahili
- Norwegian.
- French
- Filipino Tagalog .
- Swedish
- Malay.
The Top 17 Easiest Languages to Learn In the World
1. French : Why is French one of the Easiest Languages to Learn
French is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world, with around 77 million first-language speakers and 203 million second-language speakers. It’s also an official language of 29 countries, including Switzerland, Luxembourg, Seychelles and Rwanda. Due to its somewhat tricky pronunciation, French can be slightly more challenging to learn than other Romance languages like Spanish and Italian. French does share many similarities with English, especially when it comes to the vocabulary. This means that once English speakers have had a chance to learn some basic rules, they’re usually able to pick it up quite quickly.
2. Spanish : Why is Spanish one of the Easiest Languages to Learn
Spanish has always been a go-to language for English speakers to learn due to its practicality and wide reach. Well, it’s also one of the easiest languages to learn for English speakers. Spanish is one of the Romance languages, which derive from Latin — as do many English words, so the name of the game here is cognates, cognates, cognates. Spanish pronunciation is also fairly straightforward. It’s a phonetic language, for the most part, its words are pronounced the way they’re spelled.
3. Frisian : Why is Frisian the Easiest Languages to Learn.
Frisian is thought to be one of the languages most closely related to English, and therefore also the easiest for English-speakers to pick up. Although Frisia no longer exists, Frisian, which actually consists of three main dialects, is still in use in parts of the Netherlands and Germany. English and Frisian share many similarities in terms of sentence structure and vocabulary. For instance, “Good morning,” translates to “Goeie moarn” in the West Frisian dialect.
4. Norwegian : Why is Norwegian one of the Easiest Languages to Learn
Like English, Norwegian or “Norsk” is a Germanic language, which makes it easier for English-speakers to learn. It shares quite a bit of vocabulary with English, and unlike some Germanic languages, the pronunciation of most Norwegian words is fairly straightforward. For the most part, the sentence structure is also quite comparable to English, although not identical. For instance, “He comes from Norway” translates to “Han kommer fra Norge.”
5. Malay
Malay is spoken by more than 200 million people throughout Southeast Asia. Like Indonesian, it’s an Austronesian language. In fact, it shares many similarities with Indonesian due to the fact that a similar variety of the language is used in Indonesia, Brunei and Singapore. But, although Malay and Indonesian speakers can generally understand each other, there are some differences in terms of spelling, pronunciation, and vocabulary, with Malay based more on loanwords from English, and Indonesian having more loanwords from Dutch.
6. Dutch : Why is Dutch one of the Easiest Languages to Learn.
Dutch is closely related to English. It shares many similarities with English, especially when it comes to vocabulary. For instance, words like “plastic,” “water” and “lamp” are identical in both Dutch and English. The most challenging aspect of this language for English speakers will likely be the pronunciation. In Belgium, Flemish, which is the dialect spoken in the Flanders region, is actually identical to Dutch. Although there are differences when it comes to pronunciation, vocabulary and idioms, Dutch speakers can quite easily understand Flemish, and vice-versa.
6. Portuguese
Portuguese is spoken by around 234 million people around the world. It’s the official language of both Portugal and Brazil, as well as six African countries, including Angola, Cape Verde and Mozambique, making it an extremely useful second language to have under your belt. Like Spanish, Portuguese stems from Latin and uses the same alphabet as the English language, which gives English speakers a slight advantage when learning it. One thing to keep in mind is that there are some distinct differences between European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese.
8. Mandarin
Mandarin is often considered one of the world’s most hardest languages to learn, but there are a few reasons to show that this is just a myth. Start with the fact that it has relatively few grammar patterns — most of which are straightforward. There are also no tenses in the Chinese language and Chinese words do not alter their form or conjugate like English verbs. If you don’t know the stroke of a specific Chinese character, you can use the phonetic writing system of Chinese characters to text or write.
9. Indonesian
Indonesian has several qualities that make it a logical choice for English speakers. Indonesian — spoken natively by nearly 23 million people — is one of the few Asian languages that uses the Latin alphabet. Many Asian languages are incredibly difficult for English speakers to master due to the unfamiliar characters in their writing systems, but not Indonesian. It’s also a phonetic language, made up of words that are pronounced exactly the way they’re spelled.
10. Romanian
Romanian is a language you might not have expected to see on this list. But although the country is surrounded by Slavic-speaking countries, Romanian is actually a Romance language and uses much of the same vocabulary as Italian, Spanish and French. For example,”La revedere,” which is used for saying goodbye, is similar to the Italian “Arrividerci,” and the apology “Scuză-mă” is similar to the French “Excusez-moi.” It’s also a phonetic language, which means most words are spelled the same way they are pronounced.
11. German : Why is German one of the Easiest Languages to Learn.
German is, as the name suggests, a Germanic language. It shares many similarities with English, including a common alphabet, comparable sentence structure and familiar vocabulary. For example, everyday German words like “Wasser,” (water) “Apfel,” (apple) and “Fisch” (fish) are very similar to their English equivalents. One aspect of German that English-speakers do tend to struggle with is the pronunciation, especially when it comes to longer compound words like “Fremdschämen” (cringe) or ““Verschlimmbessern” (to worsen or exacerbate).
12. Filipino Tagalog
Filipino Tagalog is one of the official languages of the Philippines and another Austronesian language. On one hand, it’s not an overly complicated language to learn, as the pronunciation isn’t difficult, and much of its vocabulary is borrowed from other languages, including English, Spanish and Malay. On the other hand, the sentence structure and verb focus of Tagalog is quite different to that of English, which makes it the most challenging language on this list. But, as with many foreign languages, it’s often simply a matter of getting some practice in.
13. Swahili
Swahili is a Bantu language and another very useful second language to have, as it’s widely used in East Africa, including in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania. Although estimates vary greatly, Swahili is thought to be spoken as a native language by around 16 million people, and as a second language by up to 80 million people.
14. Danish : Why is Danish one of the Easiest Languages to Learn.
Danish is a Germanic language spoken by around 6 million people, most of whom live in Denmark. Like Norwegian and Swedish, it has fairly straightforward grammar rules and a lot of vocabulary that will be familiar to English speakers. For example, “Gode tidende” sounds a lot like “Good tidings,” and the word “dyre,” which means “expensive,” is similar to the word “dear,” which is used in English when something is considered too pricey. Because of its more challenging pronunciation, however, Danish isn’t the easiest Scandinavian language to learn.
15. Swedish
There are around 11 million people around the globe that speak Swedish. The language is classified as “Category 1” by the Foreign Service Institute — meaning it’s easier for both native and non-Swedish people to learn the language. Like Norwegian, Swedish has relatively simple grammar rules and similar words to English. For instance, grass is “gräs” in Swedish — a clear cognate (words from different languages that have similar spellings, pronunciations, and meanings). It also comes from the Germanic family of languages. Swedish is easier because it’s (more or less) spoken as it’s written.
16. Italian : Why is Italian one of the Easiest Languages to Learn.
Italian is another Romance language that English-speakers can pick up without too much difficulty. In fact, Italian vocabulary is widely used in English, and you’re probably already familiar with more Italian words than you may realise, from those relating to food, such as “gelato” and “panini” to others like “diva,” “solo,” “finale” or “fiasco.” Italian and English use a similar sentence structure in most cases, and fortunately, the pronunciation is quite logical. This means you’ll be able to read and pronounce most words correctly once you have learned a few ground rules.
17 Afrikaans
Now Afrikaans is one of the easiest languages for English speakers to learn, and a must if you plan to visit South Africa, or any of these cool countries such as Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Mozambique. You might have heard that Afrikaans is related to Dutch. It is, but they’re by no means identical twins. Afrikaans is its own language – and a lot easier to pick up than Dutch.
