Name used by its speakers (Endonym): Polski (also polszczyzna)
Native speakers (estimated): 40 million
Total speakers, including second-language (estimated): 43 million
Where it’s spoken: Polish is the official language of Poland and is spoken within the worldwide Polish diaspora. It is the sixth most spoken language within the European Union; Polish-speaking communities also exist in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, eastern Germany, and parts of Ukraine, Belarus, Latvia and Lithuania. Emigration at different times, especially after World War II, established Polish communities in Argentina, Brazil, Israel, Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States. In the UK, Poland provides the second-highest number of foreign-born residents after India. In North America, Americans and Canadians of Polish descent make up over 10% of the population in Wisconsin and Michigan, and over 5% in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Delaware—though only a small minority speak Polish.
Language family: Indo-European, Slavic branch. Polish is the second most spoken Slavic language, after Russian.
Related languages include: Czech and Slovak (closest), other Slavic languages like Ukrainian, Russian, and Serbo-Croatian. The Polish language has also borrowed from French, Italian and German.