Going global: Top 10 languages for international business growth

It's clear the world is becoming increasingly connected and business today is certainly international. Most global companies have at least given thought to the many possibilities that could arise with providing their content in different languages. 

In fact, any business aspiring to sell its products and services to audiences with different cultural and linguistic backgrounds will need to take its content to the next multilingual level. 

To successfully engage audiences, you should do it in their preferred language. Whether that's through  localizing online training to better communicate with employees, translating user guides and product manuals for customer support, or localizing your website to attract visitors from across the globe. 

Defining a translation and localization strategy for your business is becoming ever more necessary, as it paves the way forward for these global interactions. Yet, with 7,000 known living languages, it can be difficult to decide which language(s) your company should invest in providing. 

Your first assessment should be looking at your macro-level business goals and core target audiences. Before diving into the language pool, look at what languages your competitors are using to distribute their content and how relevant they are to mimic or move away from. But that's not all. 

A localization strategy is key, and a huge piece of the localization puzzle is all about the efficient management of digital content. Your strategies also need to consider global connectivity and how you manage your global content as you devise a globalization strategy and use it as a competitive advantage. 

We’ve compiled a handy list of the top 10 languages in high demand that you should consider to initiate global growth for business and marketing content translation. Check the facts and figures on why they are the best bet for your global growth.

1. English 

English is the lingua franca of business and academia. It’s spoken in 94 countries by 339 million native speakers and is the official language of the 20 most relevant international organizations, making it a very widespread language. In most countries, it’s also the primary foreign language taught in schools and can be understood by one-third of the world’s population. 

English also retains the number one spot as the most commonly used language among internet users with 1,186,451,052 users and as the most used language by 61% of websites using various content languages. 

English is, therefore, crucial for anyone who wants to thrive on the global stage. 

2. Chinese

Chinese refers to a group of Sino-Tibetan languages with collectively over 955 million native speakers. Accounting for 14.4% of the world’s population, it's by far the most widely spoken language in the world with a momentous 1 billion speakers worldwide. 

The Chinese economy has experienced astonishing growth in the last few decades, overtaking the U.S. to become the number one economy in the world in 2018. 

Its dominance in the world’s economy makes it a noticeable source of business opportunity, so it’s definitely not a language to be ignored, particularly as English is not widely spoken in China. 

Chinese is also the second most popular language among internet users, and with sales of $2,779.31 billion, the country was the world’s leading ecommerce market in 2021. If key Asian markets continue to expand their internet usage, Chinese could be expected to supplant English as the most widely used internet language in the near future. 

Mandarin is a spoken dialect of Chinese, so for translating any type of written content, you’ll have to choose between the two written forms of the language - Simplified and Traditional Chinese. While the majority of the population uses Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese writing is the one used in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The table below details the spoken and written variations of Chinese used in the major Chinese-speaking markets: 

If you need a Chinese interpreter for a business meeting or appointment, your choices are between Mandarin and Cantonese. If you have a document to translate, however, the choices are between Simplified and Traditional Chinese. 

3. Spanish

Although it might not be perceived as a language of business, with 460 million native speakers, Spanish is the second most commonly spoken language after Mandarin, so it’s no surprise to see it on our list. 

Having your business content available in Spanish can open many doors. Besides Spain, it's relevant for countries in Latin America like Mexico, Peru, Paraguay and Ecuador, and even the United States, where an estimated 37.6 million people speak it as their first language. As the US has the world’s second-largest economy and the Hispanic population in the US is projected to double by 2050, this makes Spanish enormously important. According to the British Council, Spanish is ‘useful’ for 34% of UK businesses as well. 

With an extensive network of bilateral trade agreements, Mexico has some of the most open trade in the world. The UK has also identified it as a priority country for international education. 

If you want to do business in the US, or really anywhere in the Western hemisphere, Spanish needs to be one of your chosen localization languages. 

4. Arabic

Arabic is spoken by 295 million speakers worldwide, and it’s the official language of 28 countries, including many of the dynamic, growing economies in the Middle East and Africa. Six Arabic-speaking countries appear among the UK’s top 50 export markets in goods, with a combined value to the economy that surpasses that of Spain, China or Italy. This is just one of the explanations why in a report from the British Council, Arabic ranks as the second most important ‘language of the future’. 

The Middle East represents a fast-growing market of eager consumers, there is a lot of wealth in the area and there are plenty of governments attracting tourism to their countries, especially for shopping. Obviously, regional instability is a concern, but that only adds to the demand for all kinds of content in Arabic to serve in intelligence and diplomacy. 

The internet is also rising in the Middle East, and with many Arab speakers only speaking Arabic, translation of online content is crucial to giving your business an advantage in the international market. Although Arabic has had the problem of being difficult to render on websites, the latest software has overcome this, so it's likely that more businesses will be translating their content into Arabic soon. 

Businesses should consider making their product lines easily available to the Arabic-speaking world, ensuring bright results for businesses speaking the same language, with even more significance in the diplomacy, energy and defense sectors. 

5. German 

German has 130 million native speakers and a total of 230 million speakers worldwide. It's also the fourth most used language online. That may seem like a rather small number compared to most of the other languages on this list, but it’s also the language spoken in some of the most economically important countries in Europe: Germany, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Lichtenstein. Germany itself is the largest economy in the European Union and an economic powerhouse on the world stage. 

Germany is the world’s third-largest contributor to research and development. This makes German particularly important for scientific research, placing it in the most important scientific languages in the ‘soft sciences’, such as the health sciences, social sciences, psychology, the arts and the humanities. 

With a reputation for quality, craftsmanship and intelligence, many German companies dominate their respective industries and if you want their business, you need to use their language. 

6. Portuguese

Portuguese is spoken by around 232 million people in Portugal (naturally), Brazil and some parts of Africa. It’s also the second most spoken language in Latin America (behind Spanish). It might come as a bit of a surprise, but even in the race for the most users of a language on the internet, it comes in fifth, with a whopping 171 million. In the latest CSA Research’s annual update of language benchmark, Portuguese blasted forward with 6.1% share growth after several flat years. 

For business, country-wise, Brazil is probably the main attraction. A big country, and therefore a big market, it's the largest economy in Latin America, with business opportunities continuing to grow. 

With Brazil being the most widely cited science base outside the G8, there are opportunities to capitalize on scientific cooperation and collaboration, including in the areas of pharmaceuticals and energy. 

The British Council listed Portuguese as one of the top ten most important languages for the UK’s future, citing potential opportunities in trade, science, education, and diplomacy. 

The demand for Portuguese in the US is also increasing, and although it has always been an important world language, it has only recently been recognized as an important language for business and international relations. 

It's also gaining popularity in Asia due to the region’s great diplomatic and economic relations with Portugal and Lusophone countries. 

According to estimates by UNESCO, Portuguese is the fastest-growing European language after English. It is also the language that has, according to UNESCO, the highest potential for growth as an international language in southern Africa and South America. 

Given these data, it's interesting to consider Portuguese as a useful language to unlock business opportunities located across the four continents. 

7. French

Of course, we all know French as the language of love, but it's also a great language for business. With a total of 79.9 million speakers in 29 countries, French is still a very popular language today. In fact, it's estimated that around 194.2 million people also speak French as a second language, and that number is projected to rise to 750 million by 2050, possibly even overtaking English and Mandarin. Online, it’s estimated to have around 102 million internet surfers. 

French is also an official language of several international organizations, including the United Nations and the World Trade Organization. We can expect the European Union to begin using French more often, even if English remains an official EU language. 

The French-speaking world also includes Africa, which is growing rapidly and rich in natural resources. The top 5 fastest-growing African economies include Rwanda, Tanzania, Mozambique, Cote D’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ethiopia. French is an official language in 3 of them. In countries like Algeria, Morocco, Vietnam and Cambodia, where there is a low level of proficiency in English, French is particularly useful as a lingua franca. 

If you're targeting consumers in these countries, French translation could be a good investment. 

8. Japanese 

Japanese boasts 125 million speakers located primarily in Japan, which happens to be the third largest economy in the world. It’s also the sixth language for internet users with ecommerce sales in 2021 of $128.3 billion. The British Council calls Japan ‘a significant contributor to UK prosperity – both as an export market and as a major investor’ and notes that Japan provides a wealth of opportunities, especially in terms of science and technology. 

Although their economy has shown some signs of stagnation, it’s important not to dismiss the ingenuity of Japanese businesses, where, like Germany, Japan has a reputation for excellence. Japanese companies are highly innovative, and Japan is the world’s second-largest investor in research and development, and one of the most technologically advanced and integrated nations in the world. 

Japan continues to play an important role in high-level international forums and as a major provider of development assistance. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office considers Japan an important partner in matters of climate policy, energy and resource security, the reform of financial institutions, among others. 

As TheRichest.com points out, there’s also the fact that Japan is in the process of building our future robot overlords. Maybe we all need to get with the program as Japan employs over a quarter of a million industrial robot workers. In the next 15 years, Japan estimates that number will jump to over one million, and they expect revenue for robotics to be near $70 billion by 2025.’ Robotics or anything else, revenue of that size might justify any number of economic partnerships. 

9. Hindi 

Why would Hindi be one of the top languages for your business translation and localization strategy? Hindi is the fourth most-spoken language in the world, with 343.9 million native speakers. India is the seventh-largest country by area, the second most populous nation, and arguably the fastest-growing major economy. 

Along with China, India’s huge consumer base and cultural diversity is regarded as a potentially major future localization market and a potentially significant business opportunity. As a result, the entire bouquet of marketing channels — text, audio, video, ad-film production, etc. — will likely need to be localized. 

Although India is home to 128 million English speakers, around 85% of the population doesn’t speak English, and it’s been outpaced by the use of local languages. Hindi has grown a massive 66% on a CSA Research report of the Top 100 Online Languages. This growth is mostly due to mobile web penetration, government investment and other initiatives on the subcontinent, setting the pace for all Indic languages. 

On the international front, there have been proposals to add Hindi to the list of official languages of the United Nations. If approved, all UN documentation will have to be provided in this language. 

In conclusion, India’s demographics alone provide a major consumer and business supplier, generating future demand of localized content. 

10.Korean

The reason why you should invest in Korean? It’s the 13th language in the world with the most speakers. Besides being the official language of North and South Korea, it’s also recognized as a minority language in China, all the while being spoken as well in some areas of Japan.  

Why is this important for your business? With around 81 million natives of the language, South Korea ranked as the sixth biggest ecommerce market of last year, with a total of US$92 Billion. 

This emerging market is expected to grow 5% in the next 3 years, reaching around US$140 Billion.  

Do Samsung, Kia, Hyundai, Fila or LG sound familiar? These household names were all born in Korea. If this is not proof enough that the Korean market can be one to add to your target audience, Duolingo has revealed that last year, Korean was the 7th most popular language to study in the world. 

As the number of Korean speakers rises, so do the reasons to add it to your business! 

Keep an eye on the fast-rising 

Regardless of which languages you choose, you will eventually have to add new ones as your pool of potential customers grows across the globe. 

Keep in mind this list is purely indicative of what we expect is most globally relevant nowadays. If your company has a narrower target market, your ‘top 10’ could include different languages that didn’t make it into our list. For example, EU legislation leads to a phenomenon where a language like Italian, which didn’t make it into our top 10, is currently far more translated to than Arabic. Nonetheless, Arabic-speaking countries represent a greater emerging potential for business opportunities and a growing consumer base. 

The language landscape is also evolving permanently. Good proof of this is Malaysia, with the highest number of people who use smartphones as their primary device to connect to the internet. So, Malay could soon be considered a popular language for mobile app localization and website translation. 

CSA Research showed Thai, Indonesian and Persian are rising fast due to increasing internet adoption pushed by their respective countries’ governments and should become relevant for businesses providing marketing content online very soon. 

We cannot forget the relevance that Ukrainian has gained in the last year, with an estimated 45 million native speakers. As war refugees migrate and disperse geographically, the need for translation and interpreting services from local languages into Ukrainian (and vice-versa) had an exponential increase and continues to rise.

For example, Duolingo saw an increase of around 500% in users trying to learn Ukrainian. With such a prominent emergence, if there are large Ukrainian communities in the markets you’re currently targeting, it might be relevant for you to consider adding Ukrainian to your business languages. 

Conclusion 

These 10 languages will help initiate global growth, but if combined with a digital strategy that manages content in a multilingual context, you have turned global content management into a competitive advantage. 

Remember that your own market research should come first. Also, your target audience should heavily influence what languages you decide to include in your translation and localization strategy!