structural:scholar_edition
Languages

The official language, Estonian, is a Finnic language, and is conventionally classified as a member of the Uralic language family. Estonian is closely related to Finnish, and one of the few languages of Europe that is not of Indo-European origin. Unlike Estonian and Finnish, the languages of their nearest geographical neighbouring countries, Swedish, Latvian, and Russian, are all Indo-European languages.

The Estonian language is the world's second-most spoken Finnic language as well as the world's third-most spoken Uralic language (after Hungarian and Finnish).

Although the Estonian and Germanic languages are of different origins, one can identify many similar words in Estonian and German. This is primarily because the Estonian language has borrowed nearly one-third of its vocabulary from Germanic languages, mainly from Low Saxon (Middle Low German) during the period of German rule, and High German (including standard German). The percentage of Low Saxon and High German loanwords can be estimated at 22–25 percent, with Low Saxon making up about 15 percent.

South Estonian languages are spoken by 100,000 people and include the dialects of Võro and Seto. The languages are spoken in South-Eastern Estonia and are genealogically distinct from northern Estonian, but are traditionally and officially considered as dialects and "regional forms of the Estonian language", not separate language(s).

Russian is the most spoken minority language in the country. There are towns in Estonia with large concentrations of Russian speakers, and there are towns where Estonian speakers are in the minority (especially in the northeast, e.g. Narva). Russian is spoken as a secondary language by many 40- to 70-year-old ethnic Estonians because Russian was the unofficial language of the Estonian SSR from 1944 to 1990 and was taught as a compulsory second language during the Soviet era. In the period between 1990 and 1995, the Russian language was granted an official special status according to Estonian language laws. In 1995 it lost its official status. In 1998, most first- and second-generation industrial immigrants from the former Soviet Union (mainly the Russian SFSR) did not speak Estonian. However, by 2010, 64.1% of non-ethnic Estonians spoke Estonian. The latter, mostly Russian-speaking ethnic minorities, reside predominantly in the capital city of Tallinn and the industrial urban areas in Ida-Viru county.

From the 13th to the 20th century, there were Swedish-speaking communities in Estonia, particularly in the coastal areas and on the islands, which today have almost disappeared. From 1918 to 1940, when Estonia was independent, the small Swedish community was well treated. Municipalities with a Swedish majority, mainly found along the coast, used Swedish as the administrative language and Swedish-Estonian culture saw an upswing. However, most Swedish-speaking people fled to Sweden before the end of World War II, before the invasion of Estonia by the Soviet army in 1944. Only a handful of older speakers remain.

Apart from many other areas, the influence of Swedish is distinct in the Noarootsi Parish of Lääne county, where there are many villages with bilingual Estonian or Swedish names and street signs.

The most common foreign languages learned by Estonian students are English, Russian, German, and French. Other popular languages include Finnish, Spanish, and Swedish.

Lotfitka Romani is spoken by the Roma minority in Estonia.