We have taken over the table of languages with the largest number of speakers from the web site of the best known world encyclopaedia http://www.britannica.com/. It is quite interesting in our opinion that the Indo-European languages (Serbian belonging to this family as well) take up a significant percentage on the list.
| Language | Number of speakers (in million) | Percentage of global population | Language family |
| Mandarin | 845 | 12.4 | Sino-Tibetan (Chinese) |
| Spanish | 329 | 4.8 | Indo-European (Italic) |
| English | 328 | 4.8 | Indo-European (Germanic) |
| Arabic | 221 | 3.3 | Afro-Asian (Semitic) |
| Hindi* | 182 | 2.7 | Indo-European (Indo-Arian) |
| Bengali | 181 | 2.7 | Indo-European (Indo-Arian) |
| Portuguese | 178 | 2.6 | Indo-European (Italic) |
| Russian | 144 | 2.1 | Indo-European (Slavic) |
| Japanese | 122 | 1.8 | Isolated language |
| Punjabi | 91 | 1.3 | Indo-European (Indo-Arian) |
| German | 90 | 1.3 | Indo-European (Germanic) |
| Javanese | 85 | 1.2 | Austronesian (Malay-Polynesian) |
| Vu | 77 | 1.1 | Sino-Tibetan (Chinese) |
| Telugu | 70 | 1.0 | Dravidian |
| Vietnamese | 69 | 1.0 | Mon-Khmer (Vietic) |
| Marati | 68 | 1.0 | Indo-European (Indo-Arian) |
| French | 68 | 1.0 | Indo-European (Italic) |
| Korean | 66 | 1.0 | Isolated language |
| Tamil | 66 | 1.0 | Dravidian |
| Italian | 62 | 0.9 | Indo-European (Italic) |
| Urdu* | 61 | 0.9 | Indo-European (Indo-Arian) |