List of most commonly learned foreign languages in the United States


The tables below provide a list of foreign languages most frequently taught in American schools and colleges. They reflect the popularity of these languages in terms of the total number of enrolled students in the United States.

Lists

Below are the top foreign languages studied in public K-12 schools. The tables correspond to the 18.5% of all K-12 students in the U.S. who take foreign-language classes.

K-12

Colleges and universities

Below are the top foreign languages studied in American institutions of higher education, based on fall 2016 enrollments.
RankLanguageEnrollmentsPercentage
1Spanish712,24050.2%
2French175,66712.4%
3American Sign Language107,0607.6%
4German80,5945.7%
5Japanese68,8104.9%
6Italian56,7434.0%
7Chinese53,0693.7%
8Arabic31,5542.2%
9Latin24,8661.8%
10Russian20,3531.4%
11Korean13,9360.9%
12Greek, Ancient13,2640.9%
13Portuguese9,8270.7%
14Hebrew, Biblical9,5870.7%
15Hebrew, Modern5,5210.4%
Others34,8302.4%
Total1,417,921100%

List of top five most commonly learned languages by year

Grades K-12

Higher education