Only in Kabardian 34
What this means for learners
Kabardian and Nootka share 29 sounds — roughly 46% of Nootka's inventory overlaps with Kabardian. Shared sounds are ones a speaker already knows from their native language and will generally produce and perceive accurately without explicit training.
The 18 sounds found only in Nootka represent the greatest pronunciation challenge for Kabardian 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, Kabardian has 34 sounds not used in Nootka. Native Nootka speakers learning Kabardian 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.