Official languages of the United Nations

There are six official languages used in United Nations (UN) meetings and in which the UN writes and publishes all its official documents. In 1946, five languages were chosen as official languages of the UN: English, French, Russian, Spanish, and Chinese. In 1971, the United Nations' use of Traditional Chinese characters was replaced with Simplified Chinese characters. In 1973, Arabic was voted to be an additional official language. As of 2026, the official languages of the United Nations are:

According to the UN Charter each of these six languages is equally authoritative although English and French have traditionally received preferential status and are the only two official and working languages of the UN Secretariat. It is an unspoken rule that the UN Secretary General and other high ranking United Nations officials must be fluent (at least C1 – Advanced fluency level according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages / CEFRL) in at least English and French. The UN has struggled to provide parity of all 6 languages as the English language has become the dominant world language in the digital age.

Multiple UN Secretaries General, including Kofi Annan, Ban Ki Moon and Antonio Guterres, have worked to improve multilingualism within the UN. This work has culminated in additional funding for the UN Translation Service, the creation of the Coordinator for Multilingualism role, UN Language Days, and starting in 2018, the UN News website providing translations into non-official languages such as Portuguese, Swahili, Hindi, and Urdu in addition to the official languages. These and many of the non-official languages used by the United Nations often represent the Global South. Rule 57 allows the General Assembly or any subcommittee to utilize any language other than the languages of the Assembly. As of 2025, the United Nations and UNESCO have not formally ratified the Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights.

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