1. Mandarin Chinese
2. Arabic
3. Japanese
4. Hungarian
5. Korean
6. Finnish
7. Russian
Real score by me.
1. English
2. Mandarin Chinese
3. Russian
4. all the rest
Mandarin Chinese is “easy” in that compared to english, and especially languages like German or Russian, it has nearly no grammar rules
The difficulty for western minds is the completely alien sound of the language and tones, as well the need to memorize every character, followed by use of the vast amount of commonly used cultural and historical 4-character idioms used everywhere in Chinese speech and particularly writing.
Yes, to everyone out there who is ESL (English as Second Language), English is considered right up there with Arabic and Chinese.
As a Russian speaker, military trained, I know how difficult it is for anyone to learn a second language. 3,4 and beyond become much easier.