Popularity ranking · South Africa

The 100 most popular Languages in South Africa

This curated ranking covers the 100 largest languages in South Africa, ordered by estimated audience size from Rascasse's anonymized search-behavior signals. Out of 211 languages tracked in South Africa, the 100 ranked here account for the largest measured audience reach. Zulu language, Xhosa language and Northern Sotho language lead the list with a combined estimated audience of 9M people. Across all 100 entries the average audience size is 286k, and the largest, Zulu language, reaches around 3.1M people in South Africa. Audience size is the estimated number of unique people in South Africa who actively engage with each language, derived from search demand signals. Rankings reflect search-behavior signals collected across South Africa and are refreshed weekly.

Last updated:

How to read this list

Rank

Position in the Top 100, sorted by audience size from largest to smallest. Updated weekly.

Audience size

Estimated number of unique people in South Africa who actively engage with this audience, derived from anonymized search-behavior signals.

Country share

Share of the global audience that is active in South Africa. A higher value means the audience is more locally concentrated here.

Avg age

Average age in years across the people who engage with this audience in South Africa, derived from anonymized search-behavior signals. A dash means demographic data is not yet available.

Female share

Share of women among the people who engage with this audience in South Africa. 50% is gender-balanced; values above mean female-skewed, below mean male-skewed.

Ranking

Rank Audience Audience size Avg age Female share Subtype
76 Irish language 17k 43.4 55.1% Language
77 Haitian Creole 16k 29.9 34.0% Language
78 Igbo language 15k 39.8 22.9% Language
79 Amharic language 15k 44.6 50.4% Language
80 Pashto language 14k 41.6 54.8% Language
81 Maguindanao language 14k 40.9 60.9% Language
82 Indo-Iranian languages 14k 31.6 3.2% Language
83 Romanian language 11k 39.3 47.7% Language
84 Georgian language 10k 44.3 56.5% Language
85 Soninke language 9.8k 36.9 11.6% Language
86 Urdu 9.6k 39.0 48.4% Language
87 Japonic languages 9.6k 30.4 0.0% Language
88 Slovak language 9.1k 39.7 46.0% Language
89 Armenian language 8.9k 39.6 46.0% Language
90 Jamaican Patois 8.7k 41.2 53.9% Language
91 Sindhi language 8k 37.9 45.1% Language
92 Aramaic language 7.7k 38.5 41.5% Language
93 Croatian language 7.1k 39.2 45.6% Language
94 Ukrainian language 6.5k 45.8 47.6% Language
95 Norwegian language 5.5k 39.8 46.7% Language
96 Bantu languages 5.3k 34.8 49.4% Language
97 Bosnian language 5.1k 35.6 49.1% Language
98 Czech language 4.8k 46.0 75.0% Language
99 Arabic languages 4.5k 34.0 43.7% Language
100 North Germanic languages 4.2k 38.2 27.5% Language

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Frequently asked questions

How is this list of the most popular languages compiled?

Rascasse aggregates anonymized search-behavior signals across South Africa and ranks each language by its estimated audience size. Only entries with at least 5 measured entities are listed.

How often is the list updated?

The ranking is refreshed weekly from the latest search-behavior data and re-published as a static page.

What is the largest language in South Africa?

Zulu language currently leads with an estimated audience of 3.1M people in South Africa.

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