Hiligaynon vs Standard Malay

Hiligaynon and Standard Malay share 25 sounds — roughly 83% of Standard Malay's inventory overlaps with Hiligaynon. Shared sounds are ones a speaker already knows from their native language and will generally produce and perceive accurately without explicit training.

The 5 sounds found only in Standard Malay represent the greatest pronunciation challenge for Hiligaynon speakers. The adult brain tends to map unfamiliar sounds onto the closest native equivalent — a process that produces the characteristic "accent" of a second-language speaker. Learning to hear and produce these sounds as distinct requires focused ear training, not just repetition.

Phoneme inventories from PHOIBLE. Data reflects one documented inventory per language; some variation exists across dialects and sources.