The Bee Week is finally upon us. The 2019 Scripps National Spelling Bee, US’s annual spelling competition, where hundreds of spelling whizzes will battle it out for the coveted prize, has already begun. The competition will go on from May 26 to May 31 where the best speller will walk away with a cool $40,000 cash prize. Spelling champs are nothing short of geniuses, who tackle some of the most difficult words in English language such as syllepsis, maculature, knaidel, guetapens and a ton of other words we’ve never heard before! But regular Americans, it seems, are not struggling with any of these. Google Trends has revealed that citizens across the 51 states are having trouble spelling words like “amazing”, “enough”, “committee”, “eleven” and “probably.” The toughest one to spell is “beautiful.”
Words America Struggle With:
The #spellingbee starts soon! Here is a #map of America's top spelling searches for 2019.#spelling #DataViz pic.twitter.com/cel2IAMXcV
— GoogleTrends (@GoogleTrends) May 24, 2019
Here’s a list of the words that Americans find it tough according to Google Trends:
Alabama | niece |
Alaska | preferred |
Arizona | patient |
Arkansas | family |
California | beautiful |
Colorado | favorite |
Connecticut | neighbor |
Delaware | veterinarian |
Washington, D.C. | enough |
Florida | beautiful |
Georgia | beautiful |
Hawaii | Hawaii |
Idaho | embarrassed |
Illinois | beautiful |
Indiana | activities |
Iowa | loose |
Kansas | committee |
Kentucky | ninety |
Louisiana | indict |
Maine | guess |
Maryland | heart |
Massachusetts | grey |
Michigan | amazing |
Minnesota | especially |
Mississippi | fifteen |
Missouri | definitely |
Montana | comma |
Nebraska | delicious |
Nevada | appreciate |
New Hampshire | recess |
New Jersey | grey |
New Mexico | patience |
New York | bougie |
North Carolina | beautiful |
North Dakota | independence |
Ohio | favorite |
Oklahoma | February |
Oregon | phenomenal |
Pennsylvania | pneumonia |
Rhode Island | message |
South Carolina | beautiful |
South Dakota | jewelry |
Tennessee | intelligent |
Texas | beautiful |
Utah | important |
Vermont | benefit |
Virginia | beautiful |
Washington | grey |
West Virginia | eleven |
Wyoming | tear |
Wisconsin | opinion |
"Beautiful" also ranked among the most difficult words to spell in 2018. Know Words That Americans Google For Spelling.
With this revelation, Google has laid bare an embarrassing truth – that adults are no better than children when it comes to spellings of simple words. The search engine giant based their list on the phrase “how to spell…” but Google hasn’t revealed the when, the where and the why of the searches.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on May 28, 2019 06:07 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).