The language is spoken by about 2.2 million people - there is a table of distribution of Slovenians in the world in the article Slovenians.
Slovenes live mainly in Slovenia in Central Europe (about 2,000,000 in 2006). In addition, the Slovene language has speakers in Venetian Slovenia (Beneška Slovenija) and other parts of Friuli-Venezia Giulia (Furlanija-Julijska krajina)) in Italy (more than 100,000), in Carinthia (avstrijska Koroška) and other parts of Austria (25,000), in the northern part of Istria (hrvaška Istra) in Croatia (11,800-13,100), in southwestern Hungary (6,000) as well as dispersed throughout Europe the rest of the world (around 300,000), particularly in the United States, Canada, Argentina (30,000[1]), Australia and South Africa).