Ontario

=== Language ===
{{Main|Demographics of Ontario#Language}}
{{See also|Franco-Ontarian}}

[[File:Ontario French Ability 2021.svg|thumb|Map of French language ability according to the 2021 census.]]

[[File:Hwy 416 Ottawa.JPG|thumb|English and French displayed on a gantry sign. Communities with sizeable francophone populations are able to receive provincial services in French.]]

As of the [[2021 Canadian census|2021 Canadian Census]], the ten most spoken languages in the province included English (13,650,230 or 97.28%), French (1,550,545 or 11.05%), Mandarin (467,420 or 3.33%), Hindi (436,125 or 3.11%), Spanish (401,205 or 2.86%), Punjabi (397,865 or 2.84%), Cantonese (352,135 or 2.51%), Arabic (342,860 or 2.44%), Italian (312,800 or 2.23%), and Urdu (295,175 or 2.1%).<ref name="language2021">{{Cite web |last=Government of Canada |first=Statistics Canada |date=August 17, 2022 |title=Census Profile, 2021 Census of Population Profile table Ontario [Province] |url=https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2021/dp-pd/prof/details/page.cfm?LANG=E&GENDERlist=1,2,3&STATISTIClist=1,4&DGUIDlist=2021A000235&HEADERlist=,15,13,18,12,16,14,17&SearchText=Ontario |access-date=August 17, 2022 |website=www12.statcan.gc.ca |archive-date=August 17, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220817232547/https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2021/dp-pd/prof/details/page.cfm?LANG=E&GENDERlist=1,2,3&STATISTIClist=1,4&DGUIDlist=2021A000235&HEADERlist=,15,13,18,12,16,14,17&SearchText=Ontario |url-status=live }}</ref>{{notetag|The question on knowledge of languages allows for multiple responses.}}

The principal language of Ontario is English, the province's ''[[de facto]]'' official language,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://slmc.uottawa.ca/?q=english_french_legal|title=The Legal Context of Canada's Official Languages|publisher=Site for Language Management in Canada, [[University of Ottawa]]|access-date=February 4, 2016|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161221032458/https://slmc.uottawa.ca/?q=english_french_legal|archive-date=December 21, 2016}}</ref> with approximately 97.2 per cent of Ontarians having proficiency in the language, although only 69.5 per cent of Ontarians reported English as their mother tongue in the 2016 Census.<ref name=langcen>{{cite web|url=https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2016/dp-pd/prof/details/page.cfm?Lang=E&Geo1=PR&Code1=35&Geo2=PR&Code2=01&SearchText=Ontario&SearchType=Begins&SearchPR=01&B1=Language&TABID=1&type=0|title=Census Profile, 2016 Census – Ontario – Language Profile|website=statcan.gc.ca|publisher=Stat Canada|access-date=September 7, 2019|date=August 9, 2019|archive-date=May 22, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200522192116/https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2016/dp-pd/prof/details/page.cfm?Lang=E&Geo1=PR&Code1=35&Geo2=PR&Code2=01&SearchText=Ontario&SearchType=Begins&SearchPR=01&B1=Language&TABID=1&type=0|url-status=live}}</ref> English is one of two [[official languages of Canada]], with the other being French. English and French are the official languages of the courts in Ontario. Approximately 4.6 per cent of the population identified as francophone,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ontario.ca/page/profile-francophone-population-ontario-2016#section-0|title=Profile of the Francophone population in Ontario – 2016|publisher=Queen's Printer for Ontario|access-date=April 24, 2020|date=February 5, 2019|website=ontario.ca|archive-date=May 22, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200522192203/https://www.ontario.ca/page/profile-francophone-population-ontario-2016#section-0|url-status=live}}</ref>{{notetag|name=inclu|The following figure is taken from the province's "Inclusive Definition of Francophones", (IDF) which includes those whose mother tongue is French, and those whose mother tongue is not French, but have proficiency in the language, and use French as the primary language at home.}} and a total of 11.5 per cent of Ontarians reported having proficiency in French.<ref name=langcen/> Approximately 11.2 per cent of Ontarians reported being bilingual in both English and French.<ref name=langcen/> Approximately 2.5 per cent of Ontarians have no proficiency in either English or French.<ref name=langcen/>

[[Franco-Ontarian]]s are concentrated in the northeastern, eastern, and extreme southern parts of the province, where under the ''[[French Language Services Act]]'',<ref>{{cite web |title= Law |url=https://csfontario.ca/en/loi |website=Office of the French Language Services Commissioner of Ontario |access-date=October 25, 2018 |archive-date=October 26, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181026025122/https://csfontario.ca/en/loi |url-status=live }}</ref> provincial government services are required to be available in French if at least 10 per cent of a designated area's population report French as their native language or if an urban centre has at least 5,000 francophones.

Other languages spoken by residents include Arabic, Bengali, Cantonese, Dutch, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Hebrew, Italian, Korean, Malayalam, Mandarin, Marathi, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi, Russian, Sinhalese, Somali, Spanish, Tagalog, Telugu, Tamil, Tibetan, Ukrainian, Urdu, and Vietnamese.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2011/dp-pd/tbt-tt/Rp-eng.cfm?TABID=1&LANG=E&APATH=3&DETAIL=0&DIM=0&FL=A&FREE=0&GC=0&GID=908351&GK=0&GRP=1&PID=103251&PRID=0&PTYPE=101955&S=0&SHOWALL=0&SUB=0&Temporal=2011&THEME=90&VID=0&VNAMEE=&VNAMEF=&D1=0&D2=0&D3=0&D4=0&D5=0&D6=0|title=2011 Census of Canada: Topic-based tabulations|publisher=[[Government of Canada]], Statistics Canada |date=October 24, 2012|access-date=June 7, 2016|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160704095730/http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2011/dp-pd/tbt-tt/Rp-eng.cfm?TABID=1&LANG=E&APATH=3&DETAIL=0&DIM=0&FL=A&FREE=0&GC=0&GID=908351&GK=0&GRP=1&PID=103251&PRID=0&PTYPE=101955&S=0&SHOWALL=0&SUB=0&Temporal=2011&THEME=90&VID=0&VNAMEE=&VNAMEF=&D1=0&D2=0&D3=0&D4=0&D5=0&D6=0|archive-date=July 4, 2016}}</ref>