there are about 5000 living language in the world today , but only about six of them are major language of the world .Two - thirds of the world is population speaks those six language . More than 300 million people speak English as their first language . Another 300 million speak it as a second language . No one knows how many people speak it as a foreign language . Chinese is the only language with more speakers than English . THis is because of the huge population of Chinese .In many countries , the textbooks in universities are in English .Many universities classes are taught in English although their first language is not English