Hispanophone (Spanish: hispanohablantes, hispanoparlantes or hispanofonía; also castellanohablantes, castellanoparlantes, or castellanofonía) or
Hispanosphere denotes Spanish language speakers and the Spanish-speaking world. The word derives from the Latin political name of the Iberian Peninsula, Hispania, which comprised basically the territory of the modern states of Spain, Portugal and Andorra.
Hispanophones are estimated at between 450 and 500 million globally, making Spanish the second most spoken language in terms of native speakers. Around 360 million live in Hispanic America and 46 million in Spain. There are a large number of Spanish speakers in the United States, comprising more than 34 million. There are also smaller Hispanophone groups in Canada, northern Morocco, Equatorial Guinea, Western Sahara the Philippines and Brazil as well as in many other places around the world, particularly large cities in Western Europe, and Australia.
In a cultural, rather than merely linguistic sense, the notion of "Hispanophone" goes further than the above definition. The Hispanic culture is the legacy of the Spanish colonial empire, and so the term can refer to people whose cultural background is primarily associated with Spain, regardless of ethnic or geographical differences. In a cultural sense, the whole of Hispanophones are sometimes called the Hispanidad.
