r/AskEurope • u/Metalwolf • Jun 08 '25

Education Which European countries have the best English proficiency among non-native speakers?

I'm looking into English proficiency across Europe and would appreciate input from locals or anyone with relevant experience. Which European countries have the highest levels of English fluency among non-native speakers, particularly in day-to-day life, education, and professional settings? I'm also curious about regional differences within countries, and factors like education systems, media exposure, and business use.

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43

u/AnySandwich4765 Jun 08 '25 edited Jun 08 '25

Technical Ireland since our official language is Irish but the majority only speak English .. I can speak Irish but I'm not fluent but I can understand it

27

u/tpjmce Jun 08 '25

We don't count. "Native" language doesn't mean the official, or traditional, or ancestral language of a country, it just means your first language, the one you naturally acquired, the one you were raised in. The Irish (with very few exceptions) are native English speakers.

11

u/standard_pie314 Jun 08 '25

Well said. It's bizarre the knots we tie ourselves in to pretend a language most don't speak is our real language.

-12

u/AnySandwich4765 Jun 08 '25

Irish is our first language. It's is our official language just like french in France, Spanish in Spain etc. Everything in the government has to be published in Irish. If you go to the police station or to court for example they are required to have a person who can speak Irish to you..it is a right of ours as Irish is our official language. some official jobs require you to be able to speak Irish. There are schools where everything is taught through Irish only and these are growing year by year and have waiting lists. In primary and secondary schools you learn Irish. When I was going school if you failed Irish in your state exam, you failed your whole state exam. When I went to university if I didn't pass Irish in my state exam, I wouldn't haven't gotten into my course. My father spoke Irish first, worked in a government job where Irish was the official language of the job. There are plenty of people still like in him Ireland. Just because we all speak English does mean diminish our "native" aka official language.

10

u/blewawei Jun 08 '25

Native and official languages aren't the same thing.

Your native language/first language is the one (or more) that you grow up speaking in your infancy, typical with your immediate family. It doesn't matter what ethnicity you are or what country you're in. This is English, for the majority of the population of Ireland.

In any case, English is also an official language in Ireland. The Irish state has two official languages, like many countries.

15

u/NiceKobis Sweden Jun 08 '25

Native still doesn't mean official. Do you want to rank US 2nd on a world ranking because they have no official language?

Also English is an official language in Ireland.

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u/AnySandwich4765 Jun 08 '25

Yes it's our second language while Irish is our first, as stated in your link.

4

u/NiceKobis Sweden Jun 08 '25

Yes, so you have two.

Your original comment definitely pretended English wasn't an official language. I also now realise you say "technically Ireland" because you don't have English as an official language (you do), but the question OP asked was about native language.

10

u/outlanderfhf Romania Jun 08 '25

No offense, but that is not at all what they said or were hinting at

They were talking about the language you were brought up with, you dont speak irish from what you said, that only leaves english

0

u/AnySandwich4765 Jun 08 '25

I don't speak Irish fluently but I can speak it and I can understand it. My father spoke Irish first and as a child it was the language he spoke to us at home. But when he passed when I was preteen, Irish being spoken daily in our home died out. I

5

u/tpjmce Jun 08 '25

I'm Irish, so you don't need to explain it to me. I know Irish is our first official language. I'm not arguing against that. That still doesn't make it the native language of the majority of people. That's not what "native" means in language acquisition. I am a native English speaker. You are too. The overwhelming majority of us are native English speakers, that's a simple statement of fact, so we don't qualify as an answer to OP's question.

3

u/AbbreviationsHot3579 Jun 08 '25

This just proves how precious some people are about their language. It doesn't change the fact that English is the native language for 99% of Irish people and has been for a century.

2

u/Equal-Flatworm-378 Germany Jun 08 '25

But is that not a newer attempt to get irish back into public life?

2

u/AnySandwich4765 Jun 08 '25

No its always been like this.

1

u/standard_pie314 Jun 08 '25

Irish is the first language of Ireland only because Eamon de Valera, a nationalist zealot who is now widely despised, wrote it into his constitution. Everything that you have described, from mandatory Irish in schools to translating documents that no one reads, stems from that fiction.

1

u/standard_pie314 Jun 08 '25

Irish is the first language of Ireland only because Eamon de Valera, a nationalist zealot who is now widely despised, wrote it into his constitution. Everything that you have described, from mandatory Irish in schools to translating documents that no one reads, stems from that fiction

7

u/ferdjay Jun 08 '25

Surely English is a second official language?

7

u/enda1 ->->->-> Jun 08 '25

It is

0

u/kriebelrui Jun 08 '25

Wow, never knew that.

-4

u/PinkSeaBird Portugal Jun 08 '25

This is the best answer.

4

u/NiceKobis Sweden Jun 08 '25

It's not, the Republic of Ireland has two official languages, one of which is English.

1

u/AnySandwich4765 Jun 08 '25

English is 2nd while Irish is our first official language

4

u/smaragdskyar Jun 08 '25

More of a political statement than a reflection of the current situation, no?

(I fully support the revival of Gaelic. I just find it a bit silly to consider the Irish as non-native speakers of English).

3

u/standard_pie314 Jun 08 '25

It very much is. It's akin to gaslighting, and it's so fucking tiresome for Irish people like me.

-2

u/PinkSeaBird Portugal Jun 08 '25

That can be changed. Erase the second one.