The attractiveness of English in many cultures derives from its identification as a linguistic gateway to economic prosperity. Global English comes in a wide range of different countries and settings, forms and functions, oscillating between the poles of formal and informal discourse, written and oral communication, international and local contacts, and as an expression of distance or social proximity. The most conventional classification is the one into countries where English is a native language (ENL), a second language (ESL), and a foreign language (EFL). In ESL countries, typically former parts of the British Empire, English fulfills important intranational functions as an official or semi-official language. The International Corpus of English (ICE) project has opened valuable research options for comparative research. The differences between speech and writing allow for the study of variability in a framework which is strongly inspired by and closely related to quantitative sociolinguistic methodology.