Topic summary
Languages of Spain
The majority of the languages of Spain belong to the Romance language family. The official national language is Spanish, also known as Castilian. In selected autonomous communities, Catalan, Valencian, Galician, Basque and the Aranese standard of Occitan are accorded co-official status alongside Spanish, and Aragonese, two Asturleonese variants (Asturian and Leonese) and Fala enjoy legal protection or cultural recognition but do not hold co-official status. Basque is the only language with official status in Spain that is neither Romance nor Indo-European.
The Constitution of Spain regards these languages as "Spanish languages" (Spanish: lenguas españolas).
Spanish is the most widely spoken language, used by approximately 99% of the population as a first or second language. Catalan/Valencian is the first language of 10.5% of the population, followed by Galician at 3.8% and Basque at 1.4%. Immigration has also introduced communities of speakers of Arabic, Romanian, and English, among others.