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I’ve met a few people over the years who believe that all Canadians are bilingual and that you should know at least some French before visiting us, but neither of those things is true.
According to Stats Canada, French is the first language of about 20% population, English is the first language of 57% of us, and the other 23% learned another language first. About 18% of Canadians speak both French and English.
If you’re visiting a rural village in Quebec and speaking to a group of elderly people who have lived there for their entire lives, you will probably either need to speak French with them or bring an interpreter with you. The same can be true if you’re going deep into Northern Canada to visit small indigenous or First Nations communities as sometimes the oldest living generations there don’t speak English well (or at all) either from what I have heard, although I know more about the French angle due to how much higher the percentage of French speakers is in southern Ontario as compared to indigenous languages.
The largest cities in all of our provinces and territories are filled with people who speak English fluently and the vast majority of the other rural areas in the rest of Canada can say the same.
It might be their second, third, fourth, etc. language due to how much immigration we’ve been lucky enough to have, but you should have no problem communicating with most people in big cities if you need directions or other types of assistance.
People who immigrate to Quebec are required to speak French on A2 proficiency level in order to receive Permanent Residency.
(For anyone who doesn’t know, proficiency levels range from a low of A1 to a high of C2 from what I understand, so they are basically asking new residents to be able to have short, simple conversations in that language and know enough about it to be able to fill out a form that, say, asks for your name, phone number, and home address. Fluency takes much longer to acquire and is not required).
It is not at all necessary to know French (or Pikanii, Tlingit, or any other non-English language) in order to have a great vacation here or live in any of the other provinces or territories, though.
Once I become fluent in Spanish, French is next on my list to learn. After that, who knows? Maybe I’ll try one of the many amazing Indigenous languages next.