Official and Spoken Languages of European Countries.

List of official, national and spoken Languages of Europe.

Europe is a continent with many countries (about 50) and almost each country has its own language, known as the national language. Some countries have even more than one national language.

At the fringes of the countries languages may overlap and used interchangeable, this means, people in the border regions of countries might understand and speak the language of the neighboring country.

Is there a common language in Europe so that all Europeans can talk to each other?

Eh, no, not really. There are Europeans who have learned Spanish, French, German, English, or even Latin as a second language, so they might be able to use it in the country where those languages are spoken.

On the other hand, English is on the rise used not only in Europe as a lingua franca, escpecially by the younger generation of Europeans, even so France tried hard to protect its citizens from the unwanted influence of English on French (language) culture.

However, the EU, the European union of 28 member states has 24 official languages, but in practice only two are used most often: English and French.

European Countries

Country

Official and national Languages

Other spoken Languages

Albania

Albanian (Shqip, Tosk (Toskë) is the official dialect)

Shqip-Gheg dialect (Gegë), Greek, Italian

Andorra

Catalan

French, Castilian, Portuguese

Austria

German, Slovene (official in Carinthia), Croatian and Hungarian (official in Burgenland)

Belarus

Belarusian, Russian

Belgium

Dutch 60%, French 40%, German less than 1%

Bosnia & Herzegovina

Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian

Bulgaria

Bulgarian

Turkish

Croatia

Croatian (hrvatski)

Cyprus

Greek, Turkish, English

Czech Republic

Czech (cestina)

Denmark

Danish (dansk)

Standard German

Estonia

Estonian (eesti keel)

Russian, Ukrainian, Finnish

Faroe Islands

Faroese, Danish

Finland

Finnish (suomi) 93.4%, Swedish 5.9%

small Sami- and Russian-speaking minorities

France

French (français)

Germany

German (Deutsch)

Gibraltar

English

Llanito (a mixture of Spanish and English), Spanish

Greece

Greek (elliniká, the Koine-Demotic version)

Turkish (Northern Greece)

Greenland

Greenlandic Inuktitut (Kalaallisut), Danish

Hungary

Hungarian (magyar)

German, Romanian

Iceland

Icelandic

English, Nordic languages, German widely spoken.

Ireland

Irish (Gaeilge), English (generally used),

Italy

Italian (italiano)

Latvia

Latvian (latviesu valoda)

Lithuanian, Russian

Liechtenstein

German

Lithuania

Lithuanian (lietuviu kalba)

Polish, Russian

Luxembourg

Luxembourgish (LÎtzebuergesch, the everyday spoken language), French (administrative language), German (administrative language)

Macedonia, Rep. of

Macedonian 68%, Albanian 25%

Malta

Maltese (Malti)

English

Moldova

Moldovan (virtually the same as the Romanian language),

Russian, Gagauz (a Turkish dialect)

Monaco

French

Monegasque, English, Italian,

Montenegro

Serbo-Croatian (Ijekavian dialect - official)

Netherlands

Dutch (Nederlands, official language), Frisian (official language)

Norway

Norwegian (nynorsk and bokmal)

small Sami- and Finnish-speaking minorities

Poland

Polish (polski)

Portugal

Portuguese (português)

Romania

Romanian (romana)

Hungarian, German

Russian Federation

Russian

San Marino

Italian

Serbia

Serbian 95%, Albanian 5%

Slovakia

Slovak (slovensky jazyk)

Hungarian

Slovenia

Slovenian (slovenski jezik)

Spain

Spanish (español - the Castilian version) 74%, Catalan 17%, Galician 7%, Basque 2%

note: Castilian is the official language nationwide; the other languages are official regionally.

Sweden

Swedish (svenska)

small Sami- and Finnish-speaking minorities.

Switzerland

German 63.7%, French 19.2%, Italian 7.6%, Romansch 0.6%

Turkey

Turkish (türkçe)

Kurdish, Arabic, Armenian, Greek

Ukraine

Ukrainian

United Kingdom

English

Welsh (about 26% of the population of Wales), Scottish form of Gaelic (about 60,000 in Scotland)

Vatican City State

Latin, Italian