ThePortuguese-speaking world, also known as theLusophone world (Portuguese:Mundo Lusófono) or theLusophony (Lusofonia), comprises the countries and territories in which thePortuguese language is an official, administrative, cultural, or secondary language. This article provides details regarding the geographical distribution of all Portuguese-speakers orLusophones, regardless of legislative status. Portuguese is one of themost widely spoken languages in the world and is an official language of countries on four continents.
This table depicts thenative speakers of the language, which means that the table includes people who have been exposed to the Portuguese language from birth and, thus, excludes people who use the language as asecond language (L2).
| Country orterritory | Number | % | Year | Note | Reference(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Andorra | 10,760 | 13.5% | 2022 | [note 1] | [1] |
 Angola | 23,800,000 | 70% | 2023 | [2][3][better source needed] | |
 Australia | 67,327 | 0.3% | 2021 | [note 2] | [4] |
 Austria | 3,197 | 0.04% | 2001 | [5] | |
 Belgium | 72,715 | 0.7% | 2012 | [note 3] | [6] |
 Brazil | 203,000,000 | 97% | 2022 | [7] | |
 Canada | 221,540 | 0.7% | 2016 | [8] | |
 Cape Verde | 11,800 | 2.2% | 2016 | [9] | |
 Cayman Islands | 167 | 0.2% | 2021 | [10] | |
 France | 1,089,497 | 1.7% | 2007 | [note 4] | [11] |
 Germany | 166,000 | 0.2% | 2023 | [12] | |
 Ireland | 43,985 | 0.8% | 2022 | [13] | |
 Isle of Man | 125 | 0.1% | 2021 | [14] | |
 Liechtenstein | 390 | 1.0% | 2020 | [15] | |
 Luxembourg | 86,598 | 15.4% | 2021 | [16] | |
 Macau (China) | 3,779 | 0.6% | 2016 | [note 2] | [17] |
 Mexico | 15,300 | 0.2% | 2019 | [18][19] | |
 Mozambique | 5,260,000 | 17% | 2020 | [20] | |
 Netherlands | 47,848 | 0.3% | 2012 | [note 4] | [6] |
 Portugal | 10,022,070 | 95% | 2012 | [note 4] | [6] |
 São Tomé and Principe | 214,000 | 66% | 2022 | [21] | |
 Spain | 251,497 | 0.54% | 2021 | [22] | |
 Switzerland | 297,097 | 3.4% | 2023 | [23] | |
 United Kingdom | 236,185 | 0.36% | 2021 | [note 5] | [24][25][26] |
 United States | 1,154,577 | 0.34% | 2023 | [note 2] | [27] |
| Total | 246,076,454 | [28] |
During aperiod of Portuguese discoveries and through alarge colonial empire, the language was spread to areas in Africa, the Americas, and Asia, beyondEast Timor andMacau in theFar East.Portuguese-based creole languages also developed during this era.
Today, Portuguese continues to thrive outside the Lusophone world through the presence of large expat communities ofAngolans,Brazilians,Cape Verdeans,Portuguese, andTimorese found throughout the world.
Portuguese is spoken as a first language in Portugal (the language's namesake) by nearly all of the nation's 10.6 million people.[29] The ancestor of modern Portuguese,Galician–Portuguese,[clarification needed] began developing in the north-west of theIberian Peninsula, in an area encompassing present-day northern Portugal andGalicia, at around the 9th century. Modern Portuguese started developing in the early 16th century.[clarification needed]
The region ofGalicia in Spain is not exactly classified as Lusophone, but holds close ties to the Lusophony. TheGalician language used to form a common dialect continuum withPortuguese during the Middle Ages, denominated asGalician–Portuguese by historians. Thus, efforts have been made by theXunta de Galicia to promote cultural and linguistical interchange between Galicia and the Lusophone world,[30] such as theEuroregion between Galicia and North Portugal. TheConsello da Cultura Galega (Council of Galician Culture) has been considered an observer member of theCPLP since 2016.[31]
Portuguese-speaking immigrants from Portuguese-speaking Africa, Brazil, Macau, and Portugal have also settled inAndorra (around 15,000 speakers),Belgium,France (around 500,000 speakers), Germany,Luxembourg, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. In Luxembourg, 19% of the population speaks Portuguese as mother tongue, making it the largest minority language by percentage in aWestern European country.[32]
Portuguese is the sole official language of Angola, and 85% of the population profess fluency in the language.[33] Additionally, 75% of Angolan households speak Portuguese as their primary language, and nativeBantu languages have been influenced by Portuguese through loanwords.[33]
Similar to Guinea-Bissau, although Portuguese is the only official language, a Portuguese-basedcreole known asCape Verdean Creole is spoken by the majority of the population. Most Cape Verdeans are fluent in Portuguese as well. Education and media are available largely in standard European Portuguese only.
Equatorial Guinea was a Spanish colony between 1778 and 1968 and was originally a group of Portuguese colonies between 1474 and 1778. APortuguese creole is spoken by locals on the island ofAnnobón.
In 2007, PresidentTeodoro Obiang Nguema announced a decision to make Portuguese the third official language of the country after Spanish and French. Despite government promotions, Portuguese remains rarely spoken in Equatorial Guinea, but increased political and trade relations with Portuguese-speaking nations (i.e. Brazil, Angola, Portugal) will soon increase the number of Portuguese speakers in the country. News, sports, and entertainment media in Portuguese will undoubtedly also facilitate increased comprehension.[34] The majority of the population (~90%)[citation needed] still speaks Spanish as their primary language, and Spanish is still the administrative language and that of education, while French is the second official language.[35]
Despite being the sole official language, only 50% of the population professes fluency in Portuguese.[36] However, a Portuguese-based creole calledGuinea-Bissau Creole (Kriol) is spoken by nearly the whole population as a lingua franca.
Portuguese is the sole official language ofMozambique and serves as alingua franca between the various ethnic groups in the country. Slightly over 17% of the population are native speakers of Portuguese, totaling circa 5,8 million native speakers and making it the fourth biggest Portuguese native speaker community in the world right behind Brazil, Angola and Portugal. Also approximately 58,1% profess fluency, which amounts to almost 20 million speakers (a bigger community than Portugal if L2 speakers are counted).[37] According to the 2017 Mozambican census, Portuguese is the second preferred native language (in first place is the Emakwa language spoken mostly in the northern provinces), being the main native language in both the Maputo province and the Maputo Capital in particular and a common second most spoken native language in the Gaza and Nampula provinces.
The government, courts, education and most of Mozambican media is available solely in Portuguese, and the country receives several Portuguese and Brazilian television stations.
In São Tomé and Príncipe, Portuguese is by far the most spoken language, with around 95% of the population speaking it at home or professing fluency; 99.8% declared speaking Portuguese in the 1991 census. A Portuguese-based creole calledForro is also spoken.
Large Portuguese-speaking communities are found inNamibia,South Africa, andZambia due to immigration from the Lusophone African countries. Portuguese is also taught in the schools of these countries.
There are more than 1.5 millionPortuguese Americans and about 300,000Brazilian Americans living in theUnited States,[38][39] and Portuguese is spoken by over 730,000 people at home in the country.[40] There are over 500,000 people ofPortuguese descent living inCanada; however, most of the community's population now speaksEnglish orFrench as their primary language. Portuguese is also a primary language along withEnglish in theBritish Overseas Territory ofBermuda.[41]
InMexico, mainly in the states ofJalisco,Quintana Roo,Yucatán, andMexico City, there are small communities of speakers who areBrazilians.Portuguese,Cape Verdeans,Angolans, andUruguayans are mainly from theRivera Department.
A Portuguese-based creole known asPapiamento, is commonly spoken in theDutch Caribbean islands ofAruba,Bonaire andCuraçao.[42] It is the sole surviving Portuguese-based creole still in frequent use in the Americas and given official status.
With a population of over 212 million, Brazil is by far the world's largest Portuguese-speaking nation and the only one in the Americas.[43] Portuguese was introduced during thePortuguese colonial period. Portuguese has also served as alingua franca between the various ethnic groups in Brazil and the native Amerindian population[44] after the Jesuits were expelled from every Portuguese territory and the languages associated with them prohibited.
Portuguese is the native and official language of the overwhelming majority of Brazilians, at 99.5%.[45]
Theform of Portuguese spoken in South America is somewhat different (mainly in accent) from that ofspoken in Europe, with minor differences in vocabulary and grammar that can be compared to thedifferences between American and British English,[46] but with somewhat differentphonology andprosody from the remaining Portuguese-speaking countries. Nevertheless, European and Brazilian Portuguese are completely mutually intelligible[clarification needed]. The vast majority of Brazilian characteristics are also found in some rural, remote Portuguese registers[clarification needed] (or the African and Asian ones, indicating an Old Portuguese feature lost in Europe),[47] while nearly all distinctive European characteristics can be found in any major dialect of Brazil (such asfluminense, specially itscarioca sociolect, andflorianopolitano), due to a stronger or more recent Portuguese and other Europeanimmigration.[clarification needed]
Migration from Brazil also led to a great number of Portuguese speakers in theSouthern Cone (especiallyUruguay withportunhol da pampa),Paraguay (seebrasiguayos), other regions ofSouth America (especially Bolivia) except Venezuela,Japan (seeBrazilians in Japan 400,000 anddekasegi, official numbers do not include second-generation Portuguese speakers and naturalized citizens), South Korea, the Philippines (seeBrazilians in the Philippines), and Israel (seeAliyah from Latin America in the 2000s).
Although Brazil is the only Portuguese-speaking nation inSouth America, it has the largest population, area and economy on the continent. Thus, the South American trade blocMercosul uses Portuguese alongside Spanish as its working languages. ASpanish influenced Portuguese dialect is spoken in the northernUruguayan border area with Brazil. Given the proximity and trading relations between Portuguese speaking Brazil, and its respective Spanish speaking nations, Portuguese is offered as a foreign (sometimes obligatory) language course at most schools inArgentina,Bolivia,Paraguay,Uruguay, andVenezuela, and has become the second-most-studied foreign language (after English) in these countries.
InGuyana andVenezuela, there are communities of Portuguese immigrants (mostlyMadeirans) and their descendants who speak Portuguese as their native language.[48]
Given the similarities between Spanish and Portuguese, a colloquial mix of both, unofficially called "Portuñol" or "Portunhol", is spoken by a large number of people travelling between Brazil and its Spanish-speaking neighbours. People living in the border areas usually like Paraguay and Uruguay mix the two languages in their daily conversation, a phenomenon similar to Spanglish for Latinos living in the United States.
Portuguese is co-official withTetum in East Timor and was introduced during thecolonial period. A little under 39% of the population professes fluency in Portuguese, and their number is steadily growing. Meanwhile, on theIndonesian side, it is rare to hear a Portuguese speaker because it lost in competition with thelocal language after becoming aDutch colony in 18th century. The local Tetum language has been heavily influenced by Portuguese through loanwords, andcode-switching between the two languages is common.[49]
Portuguese is present in the Indian state ofGoa, which was a Portuguese colony until 1961. Although it was the sole official language duringPortuguese colonial rule, it is mostly spoken by the elderly and educated populations today and is not an official language. Rather, Goa's official state language isKonkani, which has however picked up some Portuguese vocabulary as a legacy of Portuguese influence. Attempts to make Konkani be written in thePortuguese alphabet and reintroduce Portuguese as a co-official language of Goa have been made in recent years; presently Portuguese is officially taught there.[50]
Portuguese rule inDaman and Diu has also left a smaller Portuguese influence on the territory. A Portuguese-based creole calledLíngua da Casa is spoken in the territory. As a result of the renewed interest in the Portuguese language and culture, the Portuguese language is making a comeback. Portuguese is still taught in some schools in Goa.
Portuguese people were also present in the area of Vasai, previously Bassein or Bacaim since 1560 until 1739. Though the Portuguese were defeated by Marathas, there are some words which are used by the locals which were borrowed from the Portuguese language. Today there is a large Catholic population, and many churches built during those days are still being used for worship.
Due to theone country, two systems policy ofChina regarding itsspecial administrative regions, Macau is able to retain Portuguese as an official language alongsideCantonese. Portuguese was first introduced to Macau when Portuguese traders established a permanent settlement there in 1537. Despite being a Portuguese colony for over four centuries, the Portuguese language was never widely spoken in Macau and remained limited to administration and higher education. It was spoken primarily by the Portuguese colonists,Macanese people of mixed ancestry, and elites and middle-class people of pure Chinese blood. As a consequence, when Macau was handed back to China in 1999, Portuguese did not have a strong presence like English had inHong Kong and continued its decline which began when Macau was still under Portuguese rule. Nevertheless, it was only after Portuguese rule ended that the Portuguese language in Macau began to see an increase in speakers due to China's increased trading relations with Lusophone countries. Currently, there is only one school in Macau where Portuguese is the medium of instruction, theMacau Portuguese School, and Portuguese is also mainly taught in government schools. There has been an increase in the teaching of Portuguese owing to the growing trade links between China andLusophone nations such as Portugal,Brazil,Angola,Mozambique, andEast Timor, with 5,000 students learning the language.[51] Today, about 3% of Macau's population speaks Portuguese as a first language and 7% of the population professes fluency.[52] Code-switching between Cantonese and Portuguese are commonly heard. A Portuguese creole calledMacanese (Patuá) was spoken by Macanese of mixed ancestry but is near extinction today.
Portuguese is spoken inJapan amongreturned immigrants (500,000) or migrant workers from Brazil known asdekasegi.[53]Portuguese loanwords are also present in theJapanese language due to trading relations between Japan and thePortuguese Empire in the 16th century. Portuguese is now part of the curriculum in many Japanese schools, and many radio and television stations are broadcast exclusively in the Portuguese language.[citation needed]
InMalacca,Malaysia andSingapore (and a diaspora community inPerth,Australia) a Portuguese creole known asPapiá Kristang orCristão is still spoken by some of the Eurasian population.
England and Wales, 6,485 in
Scotland, 4,981 inNorthern Ireland
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