Poll finds the hardest words to pronounce, from Aoife to Kyiv and the right way to say schedule

Now new research outlines the names and phrases that Britons are struggling with most.

Irish names such as Aoife and Saoirse top the polls nationwide, for the words that people are searching for online.

But with Omicron and Kyiv also featuring in the top five, the findings do outline how world events are shaping conversations.

Experts at Slotbox have analysed average Google search terms across the past 12 months to see which words Britons are finding the most challenge to pronounce.

Aoife, pronounced 'ee-fa' and originating in Ireland, saw more than 9,000 searches a month, quickly followed by fellow name Saoirse (seer-sha) with 7,000 hits.

Interestingly Omicron took third place on the list, with over 5,800 searches following media coverage of the Covid-19 variant.

Fourth place went to Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. English speaking countries have traditionally referred to the city as 'key-ev', but a campaign since 2018 prefers the sounding to be 'kee-yiv'.

A spokesman said: “This list might highlight how many of us have been wrongly pronouncing everyday words without realising, and even worse, it highlights our mispronunciations of names. The influence of current events can also be seen, with many Brits wanting to find the correct pronunciation of Kyiv and Omicron to involve them in topical conversation.”

At number 10 on the list, with more than 3,000 searches, was the word 'schedule', which according to the Cambridge dictionary should be pronounced 'shed-yool' over the American ‘sked-jool’.

It comes after a poll by The Yorkshire Post last year searched out the soundings for some of the region's best-loved place names.

First up was Slaithwaite, pronounced 'sla-wit' from the Old Norse for a timber-fell clearing. Then Market Weighton, listed in the Domesday book as Wicstun which may explain the sounding of 'wee-tn'. Masham, with its name deriving from the Anglo-Saxon for Maessa's Ham, or the home of Maessa, may be easier to explain but harder to pronounce.