Kawesqar
The phoneme inventory below shows every sound that functions as a meaningful unit in Kawesqar — a Kawesqar language spoken in South America . With 24 phonemes, it has a relatively small inventory compared to the world's languages. Sounds marked with a dashed border (*) are marginal: they appear only in loanwords or highly specialized contexts and are not part of the core phonological system.
Consonants
affricate
lateral fricative
sibilant fricative
tap
Vowels
* Marginal phoneme — occurs only in loanwords or rare contexts.
How large is this inventory?
Kawesqar has 24 phonemes, placing it in the 14th percentile of languages by inventory size — a notably small inventory.
Compared to English
For English speakers learning Kawesqar, these are the sounds that will require the most focused practice.
In Kawesqar, not in English (15)
These sounds don't exist in English — English speakers will need to learn them from scratch.
Most phonologically similar languages
Ranked by Jaccard similarity — the proportion of phonemes shared relative to the combined inventory of both languages.
Compare Kawesqar with another language
See which sounds are shared and which are unique.