A main source for the ages
Words children say and understand, by age, in many languages: our count from Wordbank v3.4
MyHappyBub (analysis of Wordbank open data) ยท 2026
- Children
- About 134,000 toddler word lists and 50,000 baby word lists, in more than 30 languages
- Where
- Families speaking more than 30 languages; the most from the United States
- Ages
- 8 to 36 months
- How
- Our own count from parents' word lists in the open Wordbank collection
- What it found
- In American English, half of children said at least 50 words by 18 months and nearly all (95 in 100) by 27. More than 9 in 10 parents said their 8-month-old understood at least one word, and nearly all babies understood at least 10 words by 12 months.
- Limits
- Parents tick words on a list, which probably misses some words. Each month is a different group of children. Parents' reports of what young babies understand can be surprisingly high.