English language in Canada

Canadian English (CanE, CE, en-CA) is the set of varieties of the English language native to Canada. According to the 2011 census, English was the first language of approximately 19 million Canadians, or 57% of the population; the remainder of the population were native speakers of Canadian French (22%) or other languages (allophones, 21%). A larger number, 28 million people, reported using English as their dominant language. 82% of Canadians outside the province of Quebec reported speaking English natively, but within Quebec the figure was just 7.7% as most of its residents are native speakers of Quebec French.

Canadian English contains elements of British English and American English, as well as many Canadianisms: elements "distinctively characteristic of Canadian usage". While, broadly speaking, "the English spoken in Canada is most closely related to the variety recognized around the world as 'General American'," Canadian English's precise influence from American English, British English and other unique sources has been the ongoing focus of systematic studies since the 1950s.

Canadian and American English are phonologically classified together as North American English, emphasizing the fact that the vast majority of outsiders, even other native English speakers, cannot distinguish the typical accents of Canadian English from American English by sound. There are minor disagreements over the degree to which even Canadians and Americans themselves can differentiate their own two accents, and there is even evidence that some Western American English (Pacific Northwest and California English, for example) is undergoing the Canadian Vowel Shift that was first reported in mainland Canadian English in the early 1990s. The construction of identities and English-language varieties across political borders is a complex social phenomenon.