 English is the de facto national language of the United States, with 82% of the population claiming it as a mother tongue, and some 96% claiming to speak it "well" or "very well.

 The variety of English spoken in the United States is known as American English; together with Canadian English it makes up the group of dialects known as North American English.

 Spanish is the second most common language in the country, and is spoken by over 12% of the population.The United States holds the world's fifth largest Spanish-speaking population, outnumbered only by Mexico, Spain, Argentina, and Colombia

 Native American languages are spoken in smaller pockets of the country, but these populations are decreasing, and the languages are almost never widely used outside of reservations.

 According to the 2000 census,the main languages by number of speakers older than five are:  English – 215 million  Spanish – 28 million  Chinese languages – 2.0 million + (mostly Cantonese speakers, with a growing group of Mandarin speakers)  French – 1.6 million

 German – 1.4 million (High German) + German dialects like Hutterite German, Texas German, Pennsylvania German, Plautdietsch  Tagalog – 1.2 million + (Most Filipinos may also know other Philippine languages, e.g. Ilokano, Pangasinan, Bikol languages, andVisayan languages)  Vietnamese – 1.01 million  Italian – 1.01 million  Korean – 890,000  Russian – 710,000

 Enrollments in French, German, and Russian continue to grow at a steady pace, while the percentages of students taking American Sign Language, Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, Portuguese, and Korean have grown dramatically.

 Of the top 15 languages learned, Chinese and Arabic grew most rapidly on a percentage basis during the period under study.

 In addition to the traditionally taught languages, American college and university students are learning 204 less commonly taught languages indigenous to regions throughout the world.

 These include such languages as Amharic, Swahili, Persian, Hindi, Modern Greek, Hawai'ian, Polish, and Vietnamese.

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