#20: English
English may be the most widely used language in the world when you consider both native and non-native speakers, but it has some quirks that make it tricky to master. Most notably, it has some of the most nonsensical spelling and punctuation rules of any language on Earth. Even fluent speakers can see a new word in English and not know how to pronounce it correctly, because there are no fast rules. Plus, it has sixteen verb tenses, dozens of prepositions, and an extremely rigid word order. If you donât structure your sentence properly, thereâs a good chance you simply wonât be understood.
#19: Polish
Polish isnât necessarily easier or harder to master than its close siblings Slovak and Czech. However, as it is still a Slavic language, itâs difficult for speakers of different language families to get to grips with. For one thing, it uses the Latin alphabet and many of the same characters as English. Yet some of the letters are pronounced differently, while a handful are completely new. But what really makes Polish tricky - once you figure out the pronunciation and daunting spellings - are the seven cases. Thatâs because everything needs to be declined into them: verbs, adjectives, nouns, and even your own name!
#18: Hindi
When measured by the total number of speakers, Hindi is the third most widely employed language in the world. If you change that metric to include only native speakers, it still comes in fourth place. Thatâs because itâs spoken across India, the planetâs second-most populous country. While the nation has many different languages and dialects to contend with, Hindi is the one that will initially allow you to communicate with the most people. The fact that itâs a beautiful language doesnât hurt either. However, what makes it difficult is the writing. While some people use Latin symbols, Hindi also has its own alphabet called Devanagari script, which contains a great number of additional characters to learn.
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#17: Persian
Modern Persian is separated into three distinct dialects: Farsi, Dari, and Tajik. Of these, the most common for foreigners to learn is Farsi, which is widely spoken both in Iran and by Iranian diaspora. As such, it can be a useful language to learn, even if you never go to the Middle East. Itâs definitely not for the faint of heart, though. Persian uses a version of Arabic script, which can make it especially daunting. However, something that makes mastering this poetic language a little easier is its lack of noun genders and - refreshingly - the next to no irregular verbs.
#16: Tagalog
This is the native language of the Philippines, and itâs a doozy. Across the Philippinesâ numerous islands and cities, many different dialects exist. In fact, the variation means that it can sometimes be hard for locals to understand each other. In other words, Tagalog isnât exactly easy to figure out. If you really want to be able to talk to every Filipino you meet, youâll have to fully immerse yourself in the culture. But considering how rich it is, thatâs a very rewarding endeavor. Luckily, Anglophones have an edge because Tagalog uses a lot of English words. Needless to say, that makes communication much easier, especially while youâre learning.
#15: Turkish
Learning Turkish is a great way to not only experience Turkey, but also many other countries where Turkic languages are spoken and Turkish is readily understood. But if youâve never learned a Turkic tongue before, you might struggle. And if you arenât someone who already speaks an agglutinative language? Thereâs a good chance youâll have some trouble. Put simply, though word endings donât change, additional ones are added with agglutination. As you can imagine, this often leads to some strange Franken-words. Yet Turkish also has strict and regular grammatical rules, so once you learn those, everything else comes easy.
#14: Vietnamese
The first tonal language on our list, Vietnamese has six tones for new learners to contend with. That alone makes it quite difficult. Though it does use the Latin alphabet, the many tones make correct pronunciation seem like an impossible task for newbies who havenât encountered such languages before. However, once you get the hang of how different pitches create different words, Vietnamese grammar and word order arenât so hard to understand. In fact, many people feel that theyâre simpler than other East Asian languages. It might take years to master speaking and listening, but picking up reading and writing wonât be too bad.
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#13: Navajo
Another tonal language, Navajo is spoken by the American Southwestâs Navajo people - also known as one of the largest Native American tribes in the United States. In other words, itâs among the countryâs most prominent Indigenous languages. Like other parts of Native American identity, it has long been at risk of disappearing due to government interference. But thanks to the internet, language-learning apps, and the efforts of the tribe, itâs easier than ever for people to understand this incredible language. However, its unique pronunciations and punctuation set it apart, and make it quite challenging to grasp. But if you put in enough time and effort, learning Navajo is sure to be a gratifying experience.
#12: Welsh
Welsh has the most native speakers of all the UKâs Celtic languages. But despite the nearly 900,000 people who use it daily, itâs a pretty difficult language to wrap your head around. While it is known to be slightly easier than other Celtic languages like Irish, Welsh consonants are a handful. Itâs hard to come to grips with how to make all the sounds! Luckily, once you learn how to construct the words, youâll notice that their pronunciation is consistent phonetically. Naturally, those who speak other Celtic languages have a leg up here. But if youâre coming from a different part of the world, mastering Welsh will likely be confusing.
#11: Greek
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One of the few European languages that doesnât employ Roman characters, modern Greek still uses the very same alphabet that Ancient Greek was written in. This makes it one of the most influential languages in the western world, since so much classical literature was written in it. Modern Greek is certainly easier to understand than its Ancient counterpart, but it still has a reputation for being tough. You can thank its complicated spelling and verbs for that! Still, once you master the alphabet, youâll probably recognize a lot of familiar terms. Thatâs because Greek words are at the root of many English ones!
#10: Hungarian
As a highly complex Uralic language, Hungarian is infamous for its difficulty. The fact that it has an abundance of cases definitely has something to do with that. Thankfully, you probably wonât need to use all of them while youâre going about your day-to-day business. But itâs still important to learn the grammar of a language you want to speak. Otherwise, youâll never know exactly what youâre saying. While this adds a layer of complexity, thereâs no denying itâs worth the effort. Unfortunately, the language has another big hurdle any learner has to overcome: its love of idioms. These expressions are typically hard to grasp. But in Hungarian, theyâre a necessity.
#9: Khoisan Languages
All languages, even the most closely related ones, will have different sounds that any new speaker will have to learn. But the Khoisan languages may have the hardest ones to understand, because they utilize multiple, marked click consonants. While plenty of people know how to click their tongues, thereâs usually no linguistic reason for them to do so. Yet in the Khoisan languages, you need to be able to create these sounds and tell them apart. Whatâs more, all of these languages differ greatly from one another. Plus, they are only spoken by a small number of people in certain parts of Africa, like Namibia, which makes things even trickier!
#8: Korean
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Though a layman might think Korean is similar to languages like Mandarin or Japanese, its alphabet and pronunciation are actually extremely different. In fact, itâs technically a language isolate, which makes it incredibly unique. In other words, it's pretty much guaranteed to be completely different from anything youâve seen before! This all combines to make Korean one of the trickiest languages in the world to familiarize yourself with. But South Korea is an influential country with a huge cultural reach, which means its language is definitely worth learning. At least Korean has a much simpler writing system than Japanese and Mandarin!
#7: Icelandic
Many people dream of someday being able to read the stunning sagas written in Old Norse about adventure and mythology. For Icelandic speakers, that dream is a reality, since the language has barely changed over the last millennium. Old English, by comparison, is far more similar to modern German than modern English. But this stagnation actually makes studying Icelandic very difficult. To start, it has a lot of strict cases. More than that, itâs full of complex verbs and pronunciations that arenât always straightforward. In other words, thereâs a lot for aspiring speakers to absorb before they can become fluent in Icelandic. Considering the fact itâs an incredibly historical language, itâs easy to understand why.
#6: Finnish
Scandinaviaâs languages are certainly a diverse bunch. On the one hand, you have Norwegian, which is one of the easiest languages for English speakers to learn. On the other hand, you have Finnish, which is one of the hardest in the world to pick up. At first, its pronunciation will seem inscrutable because of how vowels and consonants can be doubled up and combined. But eventually, youâll learn there are even more confounding aspects to Finlandâs first language, as it has fifteen cases. Additionally, Finnish does not have noun genders. While this makes things slightly easier for English speakers, it actually makes them trickier for many Europeans who are used to these identifiers!
#5: Mandarin
There are roughly a billion Mandarin speakers worldwide, making it Chinaâs biggest language. But donât let these impressive numbers fool you into thinking it's simple to pursue. On the contrary, its writing system is actually notoriously complex. In fact, there are thousands of Mandarin characters in existence. Luckily, you only need to know a fraction of them to understand news articles and most written text. However, Mandarin is also a tonal language. It has four distinct tones that will drastically impact what youâre saying. So you definitely need to get the hang of those if you want to have a coherent conversation!
#4: Russian
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With similar pronunciation and grammar to other Slavic languages, the thing that makes learning Russian so difficult is the Cyrillic alphabet, which is notably employed throughout Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Another tricky feature is that Russian, like its sibling languages, doesnât have any articles. In other words, you can forget about the âtheâ, âaâ and âanââs most of us have grown accustomed to. Thankfully, Russian grammar isnât too tricky on the whole; itâs got six cases, but they enable a very free word order. As long as the endings are correct, you can mix things up a bit.
#3: Japanese
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Japan is a major tourist destination with a huge influence on pop culture. As such, Japanese has become a wildly popular language. But it still has a very warranted reputation as one of the worldâs most intricate languages. One big reason for this is its three alphabets, which contain thousands of unique hiragana, katakana and kanji characters. Thus, itâs the reading and writing that make Japanese so hard. Plus, youâll need to learn honorifics - like âkunâ, âchanâ, and âsenpaiâ -, in order to make sure youâre addressing everybody properly. It can take years of total immersion to become fluent in Japanese.
#2: Arabic
It may be spoken widely across much of Northern Africa and the Middle East, but learning basic Arabic wonât be enough to get you through visits to countries as far apart as Morocco and Syria. In fact, the many regional dialects often donât have much in common. Plus, the Quran is in Classical Arabic, which has its own particularities. Furthermore, while Standard Arabic has a modest number of vowels, there are many consonants and an extremely difficult alphabet to master. All of this combines to make it one of the most complicated languages in the world to get to grips with. But itâs so widespread that learning a few words will undoubtedly come in handy someday.
#1: Cantonese
Cantonese is Hong Kongâs primary language, and many speakers also live in parts of mainland China. Interestingly, Mandarin and Cantonese are quite similar. But the latter has some characteristics that make it the harder of the two to grasp. Once again, we have tones to thank for this. There are actually between six to nine of them, depending on who you ask. Thatâs definitely more than you need to speak Mandarin effectively. Furthermore, Cantonese employs traditional characters, which are more intricate than those typically used by its counterpart. Add in its complex pronunciations, and youâll quickly understand why Cantonese is the toughest language to learn.