Dutch once again named best non-native English speakers in the world.
It appears that, if there is one thing the Dutch do well, it’s speak English.
The 2021 EF English Proficiency Index (EF EPI) has, for the third year in a row, ranked the Netherlands as home to the world’s best non-native English speakers!
The EF English Proficiency Index (EF EPI) attempts to rank countries by the equity of English language skills amongst those adults who took the EF test.
It is the product of EF Education First, an international education company, and draws its conclusions from data collected via English tests available for free over the internet.
The index is an online survey first published in 2011 based on test data from 1.7 million test takers.
The most recent edition was released in November 2021.
The EF EPI 2021 edition was calculated using test data from 2 million test takers in 2020.
The test takers were self-selected. 112 countries and territories appear in this edition of the index. In order to be included, a country was required to have at least 400 test takers.
The report is composed of a country ranking table, several pages of analysis with graphs correlating other economic and social factors with English proficiency, and analysis of each region or continent.
The 2021 report includes English proficiency levels by gender, age group, and region, within countries, and some English proficiency scores by city.
The website displays portions of the report and has analysis of English skills in many countries and territories.
For the third year in a row (and the fifth time since the indexes inception in 2011), the EF EPI has awarded the Netherlands the number one spot, with a total score of 663 – 11 points higher than in 2020 – and falling under the “very high proficiency” category.
This means people in the Netherlands are able to carry out various day-to-day tasks in English, such as making a presentation at work or reading a newspaper.
According to the EF EPI 2021, the following countries fell into the “very high proficiency” category, all receiving overall scores of 600 and above:
The Netherlands
Austria
Denmark
Singapore
Norway
Belgium
Portugal
Sweden
Finland
Croatia and so on
