There will be 17% fewer Russian Speakers in the World by 2025 Compared to 2010. However, Russian is the Second Most Popular Internet Language

Day Figure

Author: Andrey Kortunov, Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council.

Most studies that analyse the spread of the Russian language around the world mention negative trends and make pessimistic forecasts.

According to one report, there were 312 million Russian speakers in the world in 1990. That figure had dropped to 260 million by 2010 and 243 million by 2015. And it is projected to go down to 215 million by 2025. The Russian language is believed to be losing its international status and turning into a national language.

However, in recent years, Russian has enjoyed a disproportional online presence. English naturally dominates the Internet, with 52.8 per cent of all websites currently in that language. Russian takes second spot, with 6.4 per cent, ahead of Japanese (5.6 per cent), German (5.5 per cent), Spanish (4.9 per cent) and French (4 per cent). Chinese and Arabic are way behind with 2 per cent and 0.8 per cent, respectively.

The share of the Russian language on the Internet is approximately twice Russia’s share in the global economy and six times higher than the country’s share in global finance. Is it not slightly premature to bury the Russian language as a global tongue and a key component of Russia’s “soft power”?

Data source

— А.Л. Арефьев «Русский язык на рубеже XX-XXI веков»

— W3Techs