The figure in Portugal is well above the EU average of 59.9 percent, with 97.1 percent of students here learning at least one foreign language.
English was the most popular second language for Portuguese pupils, with just over 95 percent learning the language, though this was lower than the EU average of 97.3 percent, equating to 11 million students.
French was the second most popular second language, with five million or 33.7 percent learning it, followed by German (three million or 23.1 percent) and Spanish (two million or 13.1 percent).
Eurostat further revealed that all pupils attend English classes in Denmark, Spain, Italy, Malta and Sweden. French is one of the two main foreign languages studied in Luxembourg and is also the top foreign language studied in Ireland (by 60.0 percent of pupils) and Belgium (51.9 percent).
In addition, French is the second most popular foreign language studied at lower secondary level in seven Member States, with the highest shares of learners recorded in Cyprus (88.1 percent), Romania (84.6 percent), Italy (67.7 percent) and Portugal (64.7 percent). Besides being studied by all pupils in Luxembourg, German ranks second in eight Member States, with the highest shares being registered in Denmark (73.6 percent), Poland (69.0 percent) and Slovakia (55.2 percent).
Learning Spanish is notably popular in France (37.8 percent) and Sweden (43.9 percent), while Russian, the only commonly studied non-EU language, came second in the three Baltic States – Lithuania (66.7 percent), Estonia (64.7 percent) and Latvia (60.4 percent) – as well as in Bulgaria (17.9 percent).