forms - How do you sort a list of languages?

A website is available in 100 languages. There is a form to select a language, and it includes these 8

• English


• Русский


• 日本語


• עברית


• العربية


• বিষ্ণুপ্রিযা় মণিপুরী



• მარგალური


• አማርኛ

Normally, I would sort a list in alphabetical order. However, some of these languages aren't even written in the latin alphabet. I don't think you can sort items alphabetically if the items aren't even written in the same script.

How do you sort a list of languages?

Answer

There are several common options of sorting languages:

• by importance (e.g. how many speakers use the service)


• by English names



• by latinized native names


• by Unicode character codes (first languages with Latin scripts, then Greek, then Cyrillic, then Hebrew, then Arabic, then Indo-Aryan languages, then East Asian languages)

BBC World Service and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty sort by English names, which looks outright strange (BBC):

Wikipedia sorts by latinized names. Android sorts by Unicode.

Since the hardest sorting is by latinized names, here's the properly sorted list:

• العربية [al-ʿarabīyyah]


• አማርኛ [amarəñña]



• বিষ্ণুপ্রিযা় মণিপুরী [Bishnupriya Manipuri]


• English


• עברית [ivrit]


• მარგალური [margaluri]


• 日本語 [Nihongo]


• Русский [russkiy]

However, I noticed that you have Mingrelian language and Bishnupriya, which are a minority languages and are strange to be included anywhere else other than Wikipedia. Also, the common name of Bishnupriya is Imar Thar, so when it's written properly should be placed before Hebrew when sorted by transliterated names.