List of languages by the number of countries in which they are recognized as an official language

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This is a ranking of languages by number of sovereign countries in which they are de jure or de facto official.

Language	World	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania	Countries
English	58	24	16	4	3	12	United States, India, Pakistan, Nigeria, United Kingdom. See the full list
French	29	21	2	-	5	1	France, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Canada, Madagascar. See the full list
Arabic	28	15	-	13	-	-	Egypt, Sudan, Algeria, Iraq, Morocco, Saudi Arabia. See the full list
Spanish	20	1	18	-	1	-	Mexico, Spain, Colombia, Argentina. See the full list
Portuguese	9	6	1	1	1	-	Brazil, Portugal, Mozambique, Angola. See full list
Italian	8	2	-	-	6	-	Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, Slovenia, Croatia, Eritrea, Somalia
German	7	-	-	-	7	-	Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Italy
Turkish	6	-	-	5	1	-	Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan. See also the full list
Russian	5	-	-	2	2	-	Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan . See also the full list
Malay based	4	-	-	4	-	-	Indonesia (known as Indonesian, and Malay is a separate regional language), Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei
Chinese	3	-	-	3	-	-	China
Dutch		-	1	-	2	-	Netherlands, Belgium, Surinam
Persian		-	-	3	-	-	Iran, Afghanistan (known as Dari), Tajikistan (known as Tajik)
Romanian		-	-	-	3	-	Romania, Moldova, Transnistria* (uses Cyrillic script there)
Serbian		-	-	-	3	-	Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*
Swahili		5	-	-	-	-	Tanzania, Democratic republic of Congo,DRC , Kenya, Comoro,Uganda
Tamil		-	-	3	-	-	Sri Lanka, Singapore, India (Tamil Nadu)

Several languages are officially used in two countries, these are:

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