With approximately 28 million people in 2006, Venezuela is the sixth-most populous country in Latin America, after Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, and Peru.

More than ninety percent of the Venezuelans live in urban areas – a figure significantly higher than the world average.

The literacy rate (98 percent) in Venezuela is also well above the world average, and the rate of population growth is slightly higher than the world average. Also, a large proportion of Venezuelans are young, largely because of recent decreases in the infant mortality rate. While 30 percent of the people are 14 years of age or younger, just 4 percent are aged 65 or older.

Venezuelans are predominantly Roman Catholic and speak Spanish, and a majority of them are the result of a mixture of Europeans, Africans, and Amerindians.

The country has a diverse population that reflects its colourful history and the peoples that have populated here from ancient times to the present. The historic amalgam of the different main groups forms the basics of Venezuela’s current demographics: European immigrants, Amerindian peoples, Africans, Asians, Middle Easterners and other recent immigrants.

Before the Spanish colonization of the region that would become the country of Venezuela, the territory was the home to many different indigenous peoples. Today more than fifty different indigenous ethnic groups inhabit Venezuela. Most of them speak languages belonging to the Chibchan and Cariban language families.

About 65% of the population is mestizo, or of mixed European, African, and Amerindian ancestry, while 25% are white of European ancestry and/or Middle Eastern ancestry. Another 8% is black, or of mixed black African and European ancestry, while 2% is Amerindian ancestry. Pure indigenous Amerindians comprise 1 percent of the population.

There are 101 languages listed for Venezuela in the Ethnologue database, of which 80 are spoken today as living languages.