Percentage of Multilingual Population by State

Data

Note: Some States Speak Far More Than One Language at Home

What Multilingual Means Here

When demographers talk about a multilingual population, they usually mean people who speak a language other than English at home, or people who speak two or more languages. The U.S. has no official language at the federal level, and tens of millions of residents regularly use another language at home. Spanish is by far the most common, followed by a long tail of Asian and European languages. The share varies enormously from state to state.

Which States Have the Highest Shares

The states with the biggest shares of non-English speakers at home are the big immigrant destinations. California leads the pack, where a large share of the population speaks Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog, Vietnamese, and many other languages. Texas and New York follow closely, along with New Jersey, Florida, and Hawaii, which is the only state where no single language dominates. In these states, more than a third of households typically speak something besides English.

Why Some States Are More Multilingual

Immigration history explains most of the pattern. States that have been magnets for immigrants for generations, like California, New York, and Texas, have deep, continuous flows that keep languages alive. Border states have large Spanish-speaking populations for obvious geographic reasons. Hawaii's history as a Pacific meeting point left it with native Hawaiian, Japanese, Filipino, and other languages in daily use. Midwest and Mountain states, with smaller immigrant populations, fall near the other end.

Generations and Language Retention

Who actually speaks those languages matters. Immigrants themselves usually keep their first language. Their children often grow up bilingual, using the heritage language at home and English everywhere else. By the third generation, English usually dominates and heritage languages fade, though large, constantly refreshed immigrant communities can keep a language alive for generations. That is why the states with steady immigration keep their multilingual shares high.

What It Means for States

Multilingual populations shape schools, health care, elections, and business. States with large non-English-speaking shares need bilingual teachers, translated government documents, and interpreters in hospitals. They also gain economically, since bilingual workers serve global markets and local immigrant communities alike. The census tracks these patterns closely because they feed into funding, redistricting, and language access laws, which is why state-level charts of this data are so useful.

Fun Facts

• Spanish is the second most spoken language in the U.S. by far, with tens of millions of speakers.
• California, Texas, and New York consistently report the largest shares of people speaking a language other than English at home.
• Hawaii is unique in that no single language covers a majority of households, with English, Hawaiian, and several Asian languages all prominent.
• The U.S. has no official national language, which surprises many people.
• After Spanish, the most common home languages include Chinese, Tagalog, Vietnamese, and Korean.
• In some rural counties, particularly in the Southwest and parts of Alaska, English is not the majority home language at all.
• Multilingual residents are younger on average, which affects the future age profile of high-share states.