Only in Hopi 33
What this means for learners
Hopi and Burushaski share 16 sounds — roughly 27% of Burushaski's inventory overlaps with Hopi. Shared sounds are ones a speaker already knows from their native language and will generally produce and perceive accurately without explicit training.
The 43 sounds found only in Burushaski represent the greatest pronunciation challenge for Hopi 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.
Conversely, Hopi has 33 sounds not used in Burushaski. Native Burushaski speakers learning Hopi will face the mirror-image challenge with these sounds.
Phoneme inventories from PHOIBLE. Data reflects one documented inventory per language; some variation exists across dialects and sources.