What Are the Hardest Languages to Learn? (2024)

Learning any new language is tough, but some require particular dedication and persistence. In fact, the world’s more difficult languages can take up to four times as long to study as the easiest.

In this article, we’ll explore the hardest languages to learn and explain what makes them so tricky. We’ll also share tips, strategies, and resources to help you overcome those challenges.

Whether you’re someone who is on a language-learning mission, a bit of a language buff, or simply curious, keep reading to discover the answer to the big question: What are the hardest languages to learn?

The four hardest languages

People working in linguistics have different opinions about which languages are the hardest to learn. This isn’t surprising, as some elements of learning are subjective, and many factors can influence how tricky an individual finds a specific language.

That being said, some languages objectively pose more challenges than others. Below, we’ve compiled a list of the four languages we believe are the hardest to learn and explained what makes them so challenging.

Mandarin Chinese

There are more than a billion speakers of Mandarin, making it the second most spoken language in the world. Learning it opens the door to thousands of professional opportunities and a wealth of art and culture. While the rewards are high, it can be one of the hardest languages to study for English speakers.

Here are three reasons why the challenge of learning Mandarin shouldn’t be underestimated:

1. Tonal nature: Mandarin is a tonal language, meaning the pitch or tone in which you pronounce a syllable can completely change its meaning. There are four tones plus a neutral tone, making it very challenging to vocalize words correctly.
2. Chinese characters and radicals: Mandarin uses a logographic writing system, meaning each character represents a morpheme (a meaningful language unit). Chinese characters can be complex and visually intricate, and they don’t always provide pronunciation clues.
3. Cultural implications and historical depth: Mandarin is deeply intertwined with Chinese culture, and many words and expressions have connotations that don’t have direct equivalents in other languages. Understanding these nuances requires a deep appreciation of Chinese history, literature, and social context.

Arabic

Arabic is the sixth most spoken language in the world and is the primary language of many countries in the Arabian Peninsula, the Middle East, and North Africa. However, learning it can come at a cost.

Here are three reasons Arabic can be challenging and time-consuming to learn:

1. Complex phonetics and guttural sounds: Arabic features a range of unique sounds that can be difficult for speakers of other languages to master. These include prominent guttural noises produced in the back of the throat.
2. Verb conjugations and noun declensions: Arabic verbs are highly inflected, meaning they change based on tense, mood, aspect, gender, and subject pronouns. This results in a large number of verb forms that learners must memorize. Similarly, nouns are declined based on case, gender, and number.
3. Rich vocabulary and calligraphic script: Arabic has a vast vocabulary with many words rooted in the Quran, classical literature, and cultural history. While this adds depth to the language, it’s a lot for learners to remember. The Arabic script is beautiful and intricate but also poses challenges. Many learners find it difficult to decipher, and letters change shape depending on their position in words.

Japanese

Japanese is a language isolate, meaning it’s unrelated to any other known language. With texts dating back to the 8th century, it has been around for a long time and is now spoken by about 125 million people worldwide.

This unique and beautiful language is a popular choice for language learners, but it comes with numerous challenges:

1. Multi-layered writing systems: Japanese uses three writing systems: Kanji, hiragana, and katakana. Kanji are logographic characters borrowed from Chinese and can represent entire words or concepts. Hiragana is a set of characters representing syllables used for native Japanese words and grammatical functions. Katakana is similar but is used primarily for loanwords and foreign names.
2. Honorific speech and politeness levels: Japanese is famous for its intricate honorific system, where different verb forms and vocabulary are used based on the social status, familiarity, and age of the speakers. This reflects the hierarchical nature of Japanese society and is essential for conveying respect and politeness.
3. Kanji characters and memorization challenges: There are thousands of kanji characters in use, and around 2,000 are considered essential for basic literacy. Learning kanji requires recognizing the intricate shapes of the characters and memorizing their meanings.

Russian

Russian is one of the world’s top ten most spoken languages and is the official language of Russia and many of its neighboring countries. Learning it lets you talk to millions of people worldwide and grants you access to world-renowned literature.

Here are three of the biggest challenges for people who decide to learn Russian:

1. Cyrillic alphabet and pronunciation difficulties: One of the initial challenges for people learning Russian is the Cyrillic alphabet. Learning to read and write using Cyrillic requires memorizing new symbols and understanding their corresponding sounds, which often don’t have equivalents in other languages.
2. Complex grammatical cases: Russian is known for its extensive use of grammatical cases, which involve changing the endings of nouns, adjectives, and pronouns to indicate their grammatical roles in sentences. There are six main cases in Russian each with specific rules. They are: Nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, and prepositional.
3. Nuances of gender and aspect in verbs: Russian nouns and adjectives all fall into one of three genders: Masculine, feminine, and neuter. The gender of a noun affects its agreement with adjectives and the forms of determiners, pronouns, and verbs.

Lesser-known languages with unique challenges

So far, we’ve considered four very challenging languages spoken by vast numbers of people worldwide. But some tricky languages aren’t as well-known and bring their own unique obstacles.

One thing that sets lesser-known languages apart is that fewer resources are available to guide learners through challenging concepts. And, as you’ll see below, each one has quite a few to overcome!

Hungarian

About 13 million people are native speakers of Hungarian, and almost 10 million of those live in Hungary. The language has a distinct rhythm and sounds, and it includes some excellent expressions and idioms.

If you’re considering learning Hungarian, these are three challenges you can expect to encounter:

1. Agglutinative nature and word formation: Hungarian is an agglutinative language, which means words are formed by adding various suffixes to a base word, indicating tense, case, possession, and more. This leads to the creation of longer words with complex structures.
2. Complex vowel harmony system: Hungarian has a unique vowel harmony system. This means that when you add suffixes to a word, the vowels in those suffixes must harmonize with the vowels in the root word. This system adds a layer of complexity to word formation and requires you to pay close attention to vowel patterns.
3. Non-Indo-European roots and language isolate status: Unlike many European languages, Hungarian is not part of the Indo-European language family. It belongs to the Finno-Ugric group of the Uralic language family, making it quite distinct from neighboring languages.

Finnish

Finland has a population of just over 5 million, accounting for most Finnish speakers worldwide. Like Hungarian, it falls within the Uralic language family. While some of its challenges are shared with Hungarian, it also comes with many of its own.

These include:

1. Cases and grammatical declensions: Finnish uses a system of grammatical cases, which indicate the roles and relationships of nouns, pronouns, and adjectives within sentences. There are 15 cases in Finnish, each serving a specific function.
2. Rich agglutinative structures: Like Hungarian, Finnish uses agglutinative structures, meaning grammatical information is expressed by adding prefixes and suffixes, which can lead to some long and complex words.
3. Unique phonetic inventory and pronunciation rules: The Finnish language has distinctive phonetics, including sounds not typically found in other languages. Certain vowel sounds, such as “ä” and “ö,” will be unfamiliar to most non-native speakers.

Navajo

The Navajo Nation’s reservation land in the United States has a population of around 300 thousand and is home to most of the world’s 170 thousand Navajo speakers.

While you can use learning resources for Navajo, there are far fewer than you’ll find for more widely spoken languages. It’s also hard to find tutors to offer guidance.

These difficulties add to the many other challenges the language brings, which include:

1. Verb morphology and intricate conjugation patterns: Navajo verbs are characterized by their complex morphology, meaning a single verb can contain a vast amount of information about the subject, object, tense, aspect, mood, and more. This extensive information is encoded into the verb through prefixes, suffixes, and stem changes.
2. Highly contextual nature and unwritten history: Navajo is an incredibly contextual language, meaning sentences and conversations often omit information that would be explicit in other languages. Additionally, Navajo did not use a writing system before the arrival of Europeans, making it challenging to reconstruct its earlier forms.
3. Cultural importance and preservation efforts: The Navajo language is integral to the Navajo culture and identity. It holds immense spiritual significance and is intertwined with traditional practices, ceremonies, and stories. This means learning Navajo goes beyond linguistics and requires learners to connect with Navajo culture.

Factors influencing language difficulty

We’ve considered the world’s hardest languages and the elements that make them challenging for learners. Now, we’ll take a broader approach and explore what factors influence the difficulty of languages in general.

When reading about these factors, see if you can identify some of the challenges we highlighted when looking at the world’s hardest languages.

Linguistic complexity

Phonetics and phonology

Every language contains sounds that can challenge learners, but many factors determine how challenging they are to master.

For example, with some languages, minor differences in tone and pitch can completely change the meaning of a word or sound, meaning a higher degree of accuracy is needed to understand and be understood. With others, the sounds are even more complex to produce and require a heightened awareness of the position of the tongue and lips.

These are just two of many phonetic factors that can influence the difficulty of a language.

Grammar and syntax

Grammar rules and sentence structures vary widely between languages, and some are more challenging than others. Languages with intricate systems of cases and declensions, which dictate how words relate to each other within sentences, tend to be particularly hard for learners.

Vocabulary and lexicon

If languages were houses, vocabulary would be the bricks that are pieced together to form something meaningful. Some languages have a much broader vocabulary, meaning there’s more for speakers to learn and memorize.

Many complex languages also have words or concepts you can’t translate directly into other languages, or they frequently use idiomatic expressions or metaphorical language. These traits can create extra work for learners, as they must identify subtle meanings and cultural references.

Script and writing systems

Logographic systems

Logographic writing systems use single symbols to represent entire words. Languages with these systems, such as Chinese, are typically harder to learn because you need to memorize thousands of characters, their meanings, and their pronunciations.

Non-Latin alphabets

Learning a language with an unfamiliar alphabet, such as Arabic, also poses extra challenges for learners, who need to adapt to new visual symbols and associate them with corresponding sounds. This can impact both reading and writing skills as well as pronunciation.

Unique writing systems

Languages like Japanese use multiple writing systems, each serving specific functions. This means there’s more to learn, and learners have the extra task of knowing when to use each system.

Cultural and contextual challenges

Sociolinguistic norms and customs

Languages are closely tied to their cultures and societies, but some have very specific social nuances that speakers need to be aware of. Becoming familiar with things like appropriate forms of address, politeness levels, and cultural taboos can create extra work for learners.

Pragmatics and indirect communication

Different languages have varying levels of directness in communication. Some cultures express thoughts or make requests in more nuanced ways than others. Navigating these subtle communication strategies and grasping their meaning can pose extra challenges for learners.

Language registers and formality levels

Many languages have distinct registers and levels of formality that relate to different contexts, and using the correct register can be essential for fitting in socially and professionally. Languages that put more emphasis on these things are often more demanding.

Debunking common myths about language difficulty

There are many myths about what determines the difficulty of a language. Most of these contain elements of truth, but they tend to oversimplify a process that involves many factors.

Let’s look at three language difficulty myths and assess how accurate they are.

1. “Learning languages similar to your native language is easy”

Having a similar native language does offer some advantages, but it’s not a determining factor for language difficulty. While sharing vocabulary or grammar features certainly helps, it doesn’t account for other challenges, such as pronunciation patterns, cultural nuances, or writing systems.

2. “Previous language-learning experience makes a big difference”

Having experience learning other languages helps you understand language structures, develop effective study habits, and overcome the fear of diving into a new language. But while it definitely gives you an advantage, languages vary significantly, meaning new ones can involve overcoming very different obstacles.

3. “You can learn new languages through cultural immersion”

Surrounding yourself with your target language and its corresponding culture is an excellent idea for learners, but it doesn’t guarantee fluency. You can live in a country for years and pick up just a few sentences. Learning a new language properly requires dedicated study, practice, and attention.

Strategies for tackling difficult languages

The hardest languages to learn are obviously more challenging, but they can also be the most rewarding. Learning particularly tough languages often involves expanding your understanding of the world, questioning your ideas, and connecting with new people and cultures.

If you’re learning a complex language or want to take up the challenge, the following tips should help you on your journey.

Build a strong foundation

Let’s return to our analogy of languages as houses. If you have a strong foundation, everything will be easier further down the line. While pushing yourself and aiming high are excellent ideas, make sure you invest time in mastering the basics, such as simple grammar and sentence structure.

Next, make sure you dedicate time to pronunciation and phonetics. These elements of languages are often overlooked but are essential for helping you understand people and ensuring they can understand you.

Finally, expand your vocabulary systematically. There are lots of words to learn with any new language, so it’s best to focus on specific themes or contexts that are most relevant to your life and learn them in groups.

Utilize language-learning resources

You should use a range of resources when learning a difficult language. Every resource has unique benefits that can help with different elements of the language, and using a combination of techniques and materials helps keep things interesting.

Language apps, textbooks, and articles are great for picking up new vocabulary and learning basic grammar rules. Enlisting the help of a language tutor makes a massive difference when it comes to developing conversation skills, in particular when you want to discuss complex topics that require more detailed explanations and feedback.

Finally, participating in language exchanges, cultural programs, or immersive experiences is a brilliant way to get plenty of practice and build up your confidence.

Embrace perseverance and patience

Learning any new language takes time, and complex languages can take even longer. It’s essential to embrace the journey and try not to rush things. Maybe you can study for five hours a day, but you’ll end up burning out or giving up before you reach your goal.

Rather than trying to chase proficiency, set realistic goals and milestones. Make sure you celebrate every victory and acknowledge that each small step takes you closer to your overall objective.

Conclusion

In this article, we’ve explored the hardest languages to learn and considered the unique challenges they bring. We’ve also busted some common language-difficulty myths and looked at strategies for tackling challenging languages.

If you’re considering learning one of these languages, you’re in for a long but rewarding and life-enhancing journey. This will be much easier if you make the most of the learning resources available.

We’ve suggested various valuable resources, but the surest way to make steady progress is by taking private lessons with an experienced tutor. They will be able to guide you through the toughest parts of each language, give you plenty of practice, and provide real-time feedback.

On Preply, we have thousands of top-quality language tutors available so you can find the one who’s just right for you. Getting started is simple: Select the language you’d like to learn, use filters to add your budget and schedule, and then book a trial lesson with your chosen tutor.

With perseverance, dedication, and guidance from a tutor, you can progress toward mastering any of the world’s hardest languages to learn.