As Columbus has grown, so has the diversity of languages and those speaking them in Ohio’s capital city.
While Spanish is still the most spoken language besides English, Columbus has seen an uptick in Nepali, Arabic, French and West African language speakers, among others, according to Franklin County’s 2025 Healthmap.
Angela Plummer, executive director of Community Refugee and Immigration Services, said that the compiled data from the U.S. Census Bureau tracks with what they’ve seen in their work with refugee and immigrant populations.
However, Plummer estimates that the numbers of people speaking non-English languages at home has likely increased since 2022, when the last round of data was collected, in part due to an influx of Afghan refugees after the United States pulled its forces out of Afghanistan in 2021 and Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
What does the most recent data say about languages in Columbus?
Spanish remains the most common non-English language spoken in Columbus homes, and increased from 49,949 in 2019 to 56,763 people in 2022.
Columbus is known as having the second largest Somali population in the United States, with Minneapolis, Minnesota being the first. Somali and other Afro-Asiatic language speakers increased by a little over 2,000 from 25,051 to 27,074.
The amount of Arabic speakers nearly doubled from 2019 to 2022, jumping from 8,437 to 15,285.
Those speaking languages from West Africa, like Yoruba, Twi and Igbo increased in population from 10,904 to 12,435.
Nepali, Marathi and other Indic language speakers rose from 9,668 to 11,076.
Chinese language speakers decreased from 13,072 to 8,188 from 2019 to 2022, and those speaking French and French dialects in Columbus increased from 5,789 to 7,579.
Speakers of Swahili and other language from Central, Eastern and Southern Africa rose from 3,608 in 2019 to 6,634 in 2022.
Who’s speaking what, by zip code
Franklin County’s 2025 Healthmap also included a map of what non-English languages are spoken the most at homes by Franklin County zip codes, with data detailing the most common countries of birth outside the U.S.
Most notably, in zip code 43231, which includes neighborhoods like Northland and Minerva Park, 26% of residents speak a language other than English at home. The most common countries of birth in the zip code are Somalia, Ghana and Kenya.
In zip code 43229, which also includes parts of the Northland neighborhood and Forest Park, it’s 21% of residents and the most common countries of birth besides the United States are Ghana, El Salvador and Somalia.
In zip code 43224, which includes North Linden and Maize-Morse neighborhoods, 20% of residents speak a language other than English at home. In that zip code, the most common countries of birth are Somalia, Ghana and Mexico.
In zip code 43219, which includes North Central and East Columbus, 16% of residents speak a language other than English at home. In that zip code, the most common countries of birth are Somalia, Mexico and India.
Medical business and health care reporter Samantha Hendrickson can be reached at shendrickson@dispatch.com
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Somali, Nepali, French: See what language speakers are growing as Columbus does
Reporting by Samantha Hendrickson, Columbus Dispatch / The Columbus Dispatch
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
