List of most commonly learned second languages in the United States
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The tables below provide a list of second languages most frequently taught in American schools and colleges. They reflect the popularity of these languages in terms of the total number of enrolled students in the United States.
Lists
K-12
Below are the top second languages studied in public K-12 schools (i.e., primary and secondary schools). The tables correspond to the 18.5% (some 8.9 million) of all K-12 students in the U.S. (about 49 million) who take foreign-language classes.[1]
Colleges and universities
Below are the top foreign languages studied in American institutions of higher education (i.e., colleges and universities), based on the Modern Language Association's census of fall 2021 enrollments. "Percentage" refers to each language as a percentage of total U.S. foreign language enrollments.[3]: 49
| Rank | Language | Enrollments | Percentage |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Spanish | 584,453 | 49.4% |
| 2 | French | 135,088 | 11.4% |
| 3 | American Sign Language | 107,899 | 9.1% |
| 4 | Japanese | 65,661 | 5.6% |
| 5 | German | 53,543 | 4.5% |
| 6 | Chinese | 46,492 | 3.9% |
| 7 | Italian | 45,182 | 3.8% |
| 8 | Arabic | 22,918 | 1.9% |
| 9 | Latin | 19,472 | 1.6% |
| 10 | Korean | 19,270 | 1.6% |
| 11 | Russian | 17,598 | 1.5% |
| 12 | Greek, Ancient | 11,433 | 1.0% |
| 13 | Hebrew, Biblical | 10,442 | 0.9% |
| 14 | Portuguese | 7,684 | 0.6% |
| 15 | Hebrew, Modern | 4,125 | 0.3% |
| Less Commonly Taught Languages | 31,302 | 2.6% | |
| Total | 1,182,562 |
List of top five most commonly learned languages by year
Grades K-12
Higher education
| Year | Languages | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | ||||||
| 1960 | French | Spanish | German | Russian | Italian | [4] | ||||
| 1968 | French | Spanish | German | Russian | Latin | |||||
| 1980 | Spanish | French | German | Italian | Latin | |||||
| 1990 | Spanish | French | German | Italian | Japanese | |||||
| 1995 | Spanish | French | German | Japanese | Italian | |||||
| 1998 | Spanish | French | German | Italian | Japanese | |||||
| 2002 | Spanish | French | German | Italian | American Sign | |||||
| 2006 | Spanish | French | German | American Sign | Italian | |||||
| 2009 | Spanish | French | German | American Sign | Italian | |||||
| 2013 | Spanish | French | American Sign | German | Italian | |||||
| 2016 | Spanish | French | American Sign | German | Japanese | |||||
| 2021 | Spanish | French | American Sign | Japanese | German | |||||
