For the purposes of this article, any word which has appeared in a recognised general English dictionary published in the 20th century or later is considered a candidate. The dictionaries included as reference sources for this article are:
Strange spellings
Most people are aware that 'Y' can serve as both a consonant and a vowel. However CWM (pr. "koom" - a glacial hollow on a hillside) is a rare case of a word using W as a vowel, as is CRWTH (pr."krooth" - a type of stringed instrument). Both words are in MWCD. They derive from the Welsh use of w as a vowel (Cwm being commonly applied to Welsh place names, for example; in Welsh it means a U-shaped or glacial valley, of which Wales has many).
UNCOPYRIGHTABLE with 15 letters is the longest word in English which has no letter used more than once.
Nonsense words
In the introduction to this article, it was noted that only words found in a recognised dictionary would be recorded. This unfortunately compels us to include the word DORD, which was only a typographical error, yet it managed to persist through five reprints of WNID, from 1934 to 1939. The original entry was supposed to read "D" or "d" correctly meaning the alternative notations used for density in physics. The typsetter misunderstood the directions and hence "dord" was born.
Strange pairs or groups of words
EWE and YOU are two words with identical pronunciations that have no letters in common. Other examples include A and EH, as well as EYE and I.
ough
The most notorious group of letters in the English language, as it can be pronounced at least nine different ways.
| Pronunciation -- | Example -- | Comment |
| "UFF" | tough, enough | |
| "OFF" | cough | |
| "OW" | bough, slough | |
| "OH" | though, dough | |
| "OR" | thought | Pronounced "AW" in American English |
| "OO" | through | |
| "UH" | thorough | Pronounced "OH" in American English |
| "UP" | hiccough | British, US spelling is "hiccup" |
| "OCH" | lough | an alternate spelling for "loch" |
TOUGH, THOUGH, THROUGH, THOROUGH are all formed by adding an additional letter each time, yet in some dialects of English none of them rhyme with each other.
Al, Ala, Alan, Alana are names all formed by adding an additional letter each time, ideal for a family of four.
Words of Foreign origin
I think this section belongs in Etymology, but I'll move it later
The entire history of English involves absorptions from other languages, and this process continues today. However, it is very hard to decide when a word stops being "foreign" and starts being English. Everyone would accept that "ballet" (French), "ketchup" (Cantonese) and "safari" (Swahili) are (now) English words, what is less certain is the status of words such as "zeitgeist".
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