English-Spanish Bilingualism in the United States and English-French Bilingualism in Canada and the overall state of dual language Knowledge in the two countries

September 11, 2025

Driven by an expanding Spanish-speaking population, the United States is becoming increasingly bilingual and has more Spanish speakers than Spain. The language is increasingly heard in the public domain, commerce and education making for ever growing linguistic diversity.  The Hispanic or Latino population in the United States was estimated to be approximately 20% of the total U.S. population in July 2024, with an estimated 68 million. In Canada, some 21% of the population had French as their first official language spoken representing some 8 million persons. The percentage of English-French bilinguals in Canada is higher than the share of English-Spanish bilinguals in the US as the non-French population of Canada is more likely than the non-Hispanic population to respectively speak French and Spanish. While Canada is the more bilingual of the two countries, there is considerable regional variation in rates of bilingualism as revealed in a new study issued by the Association for Canadian Studies and Metropolis Americas. According to the report, some 22% of Americans are able to hold a conversation in both English and Spanish (the combined number of Hispanics able to hold a conversation in English with combined number of non-Hispanics able to hold a conversation in Spanish) compared with about 29.5% that say that they are able to hold a conversation in both English and French in Canada. Amongst American non-Hispanics, about 9% say they are able to hold a conversation in Spanish compared with 21% of Canada’s non-francophones able to hold a conversation in French. There is however considerable regional variation in the two countries in rates of English-French bilingualism in Canada versus English-Spanish bilingualism in the US. Finally the study suggests that there is little evidence of financial incentives for English-Spanish bilingualism in the US whereas there does appear to be some advantage for English-French bilinguals in Canada