For fun and statistics if some of you are willing to take this test, please post your results here. I'm more interested in how much non-native English speakers are scoring, but just to confirm the figures claimed on their site, if you're a native speaker please don't be shy to post your results too. So here it is, a statistical tool to measure your vocabulary based on words frequency: http://testyourvocab.com My score: 14,800 words. Supposedly a native teenager speaks around 18,000 and an adult is in the 35,000 range.
English is my second (third?) language. Result from this test: Your total vocabulary size is estimated to be: 21,000 words.
Well that's the highest figure I ever heard from a non-native speaker (assuming you're not lying, even unconscious to yourself, like confidently checking the box next to words like supercalifragilisticexpialidocious). Some Dutch guys I know got in the 17,000 but Dutch all seem to speak English like is their own. And the French I ran into spoke in the 5,000 range - still enough for a decent conversation.
Sorry, I don't know this word...... There were quite a lot of words in that test which I didn't know, so I didn't check the box next to them. I don't know how I got to the level it gave me. There is one thing that you have got to be careful with, with a simple test like that. It estimates how many words you know. It doesn't test how well you can communicate. If you know the words, but don't know the grammar you'll end nowhere. Or if you express yourself in a strange fashion, the receiver/listener might not be able to understand you. Language is much more than knowing a bunch of words.