There are lots of commonly mispronounced words that even native English speakers get wrong. There are spelling rules in English, even if they are difficult to understand, so pronouncing a word correctly usually does help you spell it correctly. Here are the 100 most commonly mispronounced words (“mispronunciation” among them). Several common errors are the result of rapid speech, listened to or spoken. Many native English speakers are careless with pronunciation, not bothering or know how to correctly enunciate each word. For those new to the English language, rapid speech by native speakers often leads to pronunciation mistakes.  It helps to listen carefully to movies, radio, etc, and also to podcasts which are designed to enable correct pronunciation for the English language learner.

People judge you by your grammar, make no mistake, and mispronounced words or incorrectly used words tend to jump out at the listener and demand correction from the grammar-nazi in us!

the most commonly mispronounced words

Nuclear
It is not NUCULAR, no matter how many politicians say it like this!  It is NU-CLEAR, although
Wikipedia now lists ‘Nucular’ because it is so often (mis)pronounced in this way that it is now becoming acceptable!

Mischievous
The word mischievous … it is not mischievious … there is no “i” in the last syllable.

Picture
This is often pronounced  “pitcher.”  It is PIC-TURE

Coupon
Coupon being pronounced Q-pon. No, it’s coop-on.

Espresso, ask and escape
The words espresso, ask and escape do not contain an X! They should not be pronounced as: expresso, ax and excape.

Of course, one nation’s idea of correct pronunciation is different from another’s.  Take, for example, American pronunciation versus British, and we have many words where the acceptable pronunciation is different for each of these types of English.   For starters, tomato is pronounced tom-ay-to by American English speakers and tom-ah-to by British English speakers.

There are lots of commonly mispronounced words that even native English speakers get wrong. There are spelling rules in English, even if they are difficult to understand, so pronouncing a word correctly usually does help you spell it correctly.