Only in Malayalam 32
What this means for learners
Malayalam and Lahu share 21 sounds — roughly 40% of Lahu's inventory overlaps with Malayalam. Shared sounds are ones a speaker already knows from their native language and will generally produce and perceive accurately without explicit training.
The 25 sounds found only in Lahu represent the greatest pronunciation challenge for Malayalam 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, Malayalam has 32 sounds not used in Lahu. Native Lahu speakers learning Malayalam 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.