10 Most Spoken Languages on the African Continent

According to the Ethnologue guide, there are?7,164 languages?spoken all over the world. That is equivalent to having one language for every 1.1 million people. Some languages are more spoken because more people speak them as their mother tongue or understand them as a second language.

Asia has the highest number of spoken languages, with 2,314 followed by Africa, 2,149. There are 1,319 spoken languages in the Pacific region, 1,061 spoken in the Americas, and 287 spoken in Europe.

The African continent, which is the subject of this discussion, has a rich cultural heritage with over 2000 languages from 3000 tribes in 55 countries. Despite the importance and beauty of all the languages, their popularity varies from region to region, which contributes to the continent's uniqueness. Some of these languages include both native and foreign dialects that have gained widespread acceptance and use across the continent over the years.

With all that being said, here are the 10 most commonly spoken languages in Africa.

10. Amharic

Amharic is a Semitic language spoken in Ethiopia and ranks as the 10th most widely spoken language on the African continent. It is a subgrouping within the Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic languages. It is the first language of the Amhara people, and also serves as a common language for all other populations residing in major cities and towns in Ethiopia.?

Over 25 million Amharic speakers are present in major cities and towns throughout Ethiopia. Besides Ethiopia, it is also spoken by close to 3 million immigrants. Amharic is one of the few African languages that has its own alphabet, unlike most other languages, which use either Arabic or Latin letters.

Another interesting aspect of the Amharic language is that it is also connected to the Rastafarian movement in the Caribbean. Many Rastafarians learn Amharic as a second language because they believe it to be sacred.

9. Berber

Berbers or the Berber people, also called by their endonym Amazigh or Imazighen, are indigenous to the Maghreb region of North Africa, where they reside in scattered communities in various regions of Morocco, Algeria, Libya, Mali, Niger, Mauritania, Egypt, and Burkina Faso.

Their?language is said to belong to the Afroasiatic language family, which includes about 26 closely related languages, such as Tachelhit, Central Atlas Tamazight, and Kabyle. Currently, there are between 30 and 40 million Berber-speaking people in Africa.?

The region was previously ruled by Berbers before the arrival of the Arabs in the Arab migrations to the Maghreb.?Over the course of time, many Berbers have intermixed with a number of other ethnic groups, particularly Arabs, making them more easily identifiable on a linguistic rather than racial basis.

8. Oromo

Oromo is an Afroasiatic language belonging to the Cushitic branch. The three most prominent Cushitic languages are Oromo, Somali, and Afar.? Oromo?language is derived from the Ethiopian state of Oromia and northern Kenya, and is primarily spoken by the Oromo people and other nearby ethnic groups in South Africa, Libya, Egypt, and Sudan.

More than 41.7 million people in Ethiopia speak Oromo, representing 33.8% of the total population. Furthermore, it is the second most spoken language in Ethiopia, after Amharic.

7. Igbo

Igbo or Ibo is the official native language cluster of the Igbo people, a meta-ethnicity from Southern Nigeria that belongs to the Benue-Congo group of the Niger-Congo language family.? The Igbos are also one of Africa's biggest ethnic groups.?

Currently, there are around 44 million people in Africa who speak the Igbo dialect. Interestingly, the only place where the Igbo language is widely spoken outside of Nigeria is in Equatorial Guinea, where it's considered a local dialect. Not only that, there are also indications of the existence of the Igbo languages in some part of Cameroon.?

It is important to note that the number of Igboid dialects varies depending on the classification of a language versus a dialect, resulting in a possible number of up to 15 distinct dialects.?

The diversity present within the Igbo community is one of the appealing and dynamic features of African culture.?

6. Yoruba

Yoruba is the language of the Yoruba ethnic group and is regarded as one of the principal languages of Nigeria and West Africa, with the majority of its speakers residing in Southwestern and Central Nigeria.

Around 50 million people in the world speak Yoruba, and another 5 million speak it as a second language.?As a pluricentric language, Yoruba-speaking populations are found in other west African countries, including Benin Republic, Ghana, Togo, Ivory Coast, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.?

The Yoruba language is unique in that it is made up of three distinct tones, which are written using the Pan-Nigerian alphabet, a variant of the Latin alphabet.

5. Hausa

The Hausa language is part of the Chadic language group and is thought of as the fifth most spoken language in Africa. It is spoken by the Hausa people of northern Nigeria and other African countries, such as Ghana, Cameroon, Benin, and Togo, as well as southern Niger, Ivory Coast, Chad, and Sudan.?

Hausa is the second most commonly spoken language in Nigeria, accounting for 53.7 million speakers, after English. The estimated number of Hausa speakers in Africa is between 80 and 85 million people. However, the number of native speakers is unknown.

Another intriguing aspect of the Hausa language is its widespread utilization in the domains of business and education in Nigeria and other regions of West Africa. Furthermore, it is one of the few African languages taught by international universities because of its rich literature.?

4. French

France and Belgium introduced French to Africa through colonialism, and it's still widely spoken in 29 African nations in west and Central Africa, even after independence.?

Around 300 million people worldwide speak French, with Africa having the highest proportion of French-speaking people. At present, French is the fourth most spoken language in Africa, with approximately 115 million Africans utilizing it as their primary or secondary language.?By the year 2050, it is estimated that there will be approximately 700 million French speakers around the world, with 80% of them coming from Africa.?

Despite a decrease in the number of French learners in Europe, the overall number of speakers is increasing, largely due to its presence in African nations.?In Africa, French is often used with other native languages. However, French has become the predominant language in certain parts of Africa, such as Abidjan in the Ivory Coast and Gabon.?

Togo, Senegal, Seychelles, Rwanda, Niger, Mali, Madagascar, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Congo, Algeria, Chad, Burkina Faso, Benin, and Burundi are the countries with a strong French presence in Africa.?

3. Swahili

Swahili, also known as Kiswahili (Arabic word for Coast), is the third most spoken language in Africa and the indigenous language of the Swahili people, mainly found in Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambique.??

In countries like Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zanzibar, DRC, Zambia, Mozambique, Malawi, Rwanda, Burundi, Somalia, and the Comoros island, the Swahili language is widely recognized and used.?There are well over 200 million people in Africa and the Middle East who speak Swahili, but only 15 million of them use it as their first language.??

The Swahili language is believed to have originated near the coastlines of Kenya and Tanzania. It?combines languages from various nations and draws 40% of its vocabulary from Arabic.?

Various scholars are of the opinion that the spread of the language was influenced by the interaction between Arab traders and the coastal people of eastern Africa between the 15th and 16th centuries.?Certain Swahili expressions may have also been influenced by German, Portuguese, English, Hindustani, and French.

Another interesting fact about Swahili is that, Shikomor, the official language of the Comoros and also spoken in Mayotte (Shimaore), is closely related to Swahili and is sometimes considered to be a dialect of the Swahili language, even though other authorities consider it to be its own distinct language.

During its 41st session in 2021, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declared July 7 to be World Kiswahili Language Day.

2. Arabic

Arabic is the second most spoken language in Africa, even though most of its speakers are concentrated in the continent's northern and sub-Saharan regions.??There are around 150 million people who speak Arabic in Africa, showing how external influences have shaped the continent for a long time.?

Arabic speakers in Africa account for over 50% of the total speakers of Arabic in the world. Many African nations, including Chad, Algeria, Djibouti, Comoros, Egypt, Mauritania, Eritrea, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia, use Arabic as their official language. Arabic also has a considerable number of speakers in Tanzania, Zanzibar, Western Sahara, and Somalia, as well as in Western Sahara.

There are three distinct categories for the Arabic language: Quranic-Classical Arabic, Modern-Standard Arabic, and Dialect-Colloquial Arabic.? If you are capable of learning modern-standard Arabic, you may find it easier to communicate with other Arabic speakers around the world.?

Moreover, Modern-day Arabic is regarded as one of the six official languages by the United Nations, with the majority of formal communication conducted using it.?However, native speakers of Arabic may not always be comfortable with this particular form of Arabic. Instead, they would prefer to acquire knowledge in Arabic that has been a part of their culture in a manner that is distinct from modern-day standard Arabic.

1. English

English is undoubtedly the most commonly spoken language in Africa and was introduced to the continent by the British during their colonization. It is spoken by around 237 million people in 23 countries in Africa, with Nigeria having the highest number of speakers with 111 million, followed by Uganda 29 million, South Africa 16 million, and Cameroon 9.8 million.

In a number of former British colonies in Africa, English has become the official language used for government functions, business, and education.?

The following African countries speak English as an official language: Botswana, Cameroon, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, Nigeria, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

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