Ask anyone what the hardest language to learn is, and watch the debate catch fire. One will claim that Mandarin and its tricky tones is the hardest one. Another will point at Arabic, or Finnish. Or that friend who gave up on Japanese will swear that his headaches started because of its three writings system.
Yet, there is actually no single winner to this contest (if one considers it a contest, that is). But since you still need a real answer, this guide is for you!
Keep on reading to find out more!
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Key Takeaway
- The American Foreign Service Institute (FSI) ranks Mandarin, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, and Cantonese as the hardest languages for English speakers.
- Difficulty depends on various linguistic aspects such as tones, writing system, grammar, and distance from the learner’s native language.
- The list of the most challenging languages to learn is never the same for speakers of other languages, as language proximity shifts.
- A difficult language does not mean that it is impossible to learn. Learners who pick a “hard” language they genuinely care about and stick with long enough will ultimately achieve fluency.
What Is The Hardest Language To Learn?
For English speakers, the hardest language to learn is any that differs significantly from English in sounds, writing, and linguistic structure.
The FSI, the US government’s main training institute for diplomats, sorts world languages into five categories based on how many classroom hours an English speaker needs to reach working proficiency. Category V is the highest on the scale, and includes about 88 weeks, or 2,200 hours, of intensive language study.
Here is a quick breakdown of the FSI’s language difficulty ranking:
| Category | Classroom Hours | Weeks | Difficulty | Example Languages |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| I | 600 to 750 | 24 to 30 | Close to English | Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch |
| II | About 750 | 30 | Moderate | German, Indonesian, Malay |
| III | 900 | 36 | Slightly hard | Czech, Albanian, Swahili |
| IV | 1,100 | 44 | Hard | Russian, Thai, Vietnamese, Finnish, Turkish, Hungarian, Serbian |
| V | 2,200 | 88 | Very hard | Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic |
If you’re not a native speaker of English, you might find this ranking a bit unreliable as it doesn’t take into account how native speakers of other languages perceive other languages in terms of proximity and complexity.
What Makes A Language Difficult?
There are various key factors that decide how hard a language is.
Linguistic distance comes first. The further a language sits from your native tongue in vocabulary and structure, the longer learning it takes.
For example, English speakers may learn Dutch and other Germanic languages easily because they share many things in common. On the other hand, they might take a longer time to learn Mandarin Chinese because this language shares almost nothing with English.
Unfamiliar writing systems come second. In fact, a Latin alphabet only takes days to master, while character-based writing systems like Chinese Hanzi or Thaï require years of reading and writing practice.
Phonetics matter too: tones, clicks, or unfamiliar sounds, vowel harmony, and consonant clusters force an untrained ear to work more. And there are also complex grammar systems that make learning language structures even more difficult.
What Is The Hardest Language To Learn For English Speakers?
Using the FSI data and what learners actually report, one language keeps coming back on the top of language difficulty lists.
As a tonal language with thousands of characters, Mandarin is considered the number one most difficult language to learn for English speakers.
Indeed, one syllable, ma, can mean “mother”, “horse”, or “scold” depending on the tone with which it is pronounced. One mistake and your sentence can take a fully different meaning!
And of course, other Chinese languages like Cantonese can also be added to this ranking.
What Are the Hardest Languages To Learn For Non-English Speakers?
For non-English speakers learning foreign languages, the FSI rankings lose their meaning.
Indeed, an Arabic speaker can pick up Semitic languages like Hebrew and Amharic or any language from related language families, far faster than an English speaker does.
Similarly, a Chinese speaker can have a very easy start with Japanese because Kanji are basically Chinese characters.
Meanwhile, Romance language speakers can go through French and Spanish at a speed that Japanese speakers, wrestling with articles, gender, and conjugation tables, can never emulate.
So, as you can see, the term “hardest language” does not necessarily mean the same thing for everyone!
You’re a native English speaker, and you’re curious about the other end of the ladder? Our guide to the easiest language to learn for beginners might grab your interest!
How To Learn A Difficult Language Without Burning Out?
Hard languages can actually be learned quite easily, but only if you have the right motivation and if you learn regularly. Here are some tips that can help you in your language learning journey without feeling burned out:
- Pick a language according to your goal: the goal you set is what will make you see progress
- Shrink your daily goal: Build good learning habits with only 10 minutes every day. This will help you build more skill than one single Sunday session.
- Start with sounds: Written language might be important, but not as much as training your ear to recognize wholly new sounds.
- Use apps and other online tools: Language apps and other online tools are like gold mines for learning hard languages without too much effort.
FAQs: The Hardest Language To Learn
How Long Does It Take To Learn Hard Languages?
Achieving fluency in hard languages takes about 88 weeks or 2,200 classroom hours, as per the FSI. You can start having basic conversations very early, though, often within a few months of daily practice.
Is It Worth Learning A Hard Language?
Yes, hard languages like Arabic or Chinese are very often ones worth learning because they are highly valued in various fields, such as politics, culture, and business.
What Is The Hardest Language To Learn?
For English speakers, the hardest languages to learn are usually the ones found in the fifth category of the FSI languages difficulty framework. This includes Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Arabic, each requiring around 2,200 hours of study to reach fluency. However, Mandarin tops most of the difficulty rankings because of its tones and its thousands of characters.
Ready To Take On A Hard Language With Ling?
Congrats if you’ve read this far! You might be the kind of learner who finishes what they start, and maybe you’re ready to take on a new challenge and start learning a hard language!
Good news for you! Ling brings exactly what you need in terms of learning content and structure! All that is left is for you to start a lesson!
Don’t wait then! Quickly download the Ling app and start your first challenge today!
