According to this year’s EF English Proficiency Index, the Netherlands has the best non-native speakers of English, and when it comes to the Dutch city, Rotterdam residents score the highest.
This is the ninth edition of the EF EPI and it is based on test data from more than 2.300.000 adult test-takers in 100 countries and over 400 cities and regions around the world who took EF English tests in 2018. In this edition the Netherlands has come out on top, moving up a place from last year, and scoring 70,27 on the index. The EF EPI average score for Europe was 56,71, with 12 European countries scoring above this.
The index places a country’s level of proficiency into the following categories: very high, high, moderate, low and very low. Just 14 countries made it into the very high category, South Africa and Singapore being the only non-European countries achieving a place in this category. In the very high category, scores ranged from 70,27 (Netherlands) to 63,07 (Croatia).
According to the study, women in the Netherlands speak English marginally better than men, scoring 70,37 as opposed to 70,09. When it comes to cities, Rotterdam has the best non-native English speakers, scoring 71,68. Amsterdam comes in a close second, with 71,35 points and The Hague is third with 71,27. Other cities in the Netherlands also score well, with Eindhoven taking fourth place, followed by Nijmegen, Breda and Arnhem.
When it comes to the countries with the best non-native English speakers, the top 10 is as follows:
1. Netherlands
2. Sweden
3. Norway
4. Denmark
5. Singapore
6. South Africa
7. Finland
8. Austria
9. Luxembourg
10. Germany
The bottom 10 on the index, and thus with the worst proficiency in English are:
91. Angola
92. Oman
93. Kazakhstan
94. Cambodia
95. Uzbekistan
96. Ivory Coast
97. Iraq
98. Saudi Arabia
99. Kyrgyzstan
100. Libya
For more information, please see the EF English Proficiency Index website.