You've heard about the fact that British and American English are not 100% the same, right? Despite being just one language, the English language, they have enough differences that it's possible to tell which region the speaker came from just by reading a few sentences.

This phenomenon is the same as what happens when we compare the Portuguese spoken in Portugal and the Portuguese spoken by us Brazilians. Even though they are the same language, there are semantic and accent distinctions that make it clear that each of these dialects is used in a different region.

Understanding the differences between both ways of speaking the English language helps when training your own pronunciation. and also defines many words that you will use in your vocabulary – after all, some have different meanings depending on the region you are in. To help you understand the details about the topic, CCAA has prepared content explaining the most distinct points of the two dialects!

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Main differences between British and American English

A language is not something immutable; it is altered by the customs of the people who use it: the languages spoken in nearby regions, slang created over time, and other elements of the most diverse types. Because of this, even countries that share a language, such as the USA and the United Kingdom, end up creating their own version of the mother tongue.

It is also important to note that there is no homogeneity in terms of dialects in any of these territories. The way someone from California speaks will never be the same as someone living in Virginia. Each region has its own particularity. Even so, it is possible to identify that both accents are from the North American states, not from the lands of the King.

With that in mind, here are the four main differences between British and American English!

1. Vocabulary

When you learned linguistic variation in Portuguese classes, you certainly saw the example of the terms “manioc”, “aipim” and “macaxeira”. They are all spoken in a certain part of the country and refer to the same food, but there is no similarity between them.

When thinking about UK and US English, we also notice these changes, words that do not have the same root, but refer to the same object. This happens in more than 100 cases between the two major dialects of the English language, such as “subway”, which is the term used to refer to the “metro” by North Americans, while the English use “underground”.

This is one of the main differences between regions, as it is present in the daily lives of all speakers. The simplest words and even technical terms have changed in such a way that, if you do not have prior knowledge of the way of speaking where you are, you will have complete difficulty understanding some sentences.

Check out some vocabulary changes between the English of these two places!

2. Pronunciation

The way the natives of these two locations position their mouths when communicating is also very characteristic. While many times British English has the “a” sound pronounced with the mouth wider open, American English closes this part and ends the word with a sound similar to “é”.

The stressed syllable of some words also shifts when we switch from a British to an American accent. For example, in the case of “weekend”: while Europeans emphasize the end of the term by pronouncing “week-END”, North Americans do this with the beginning of the word and say “WEEK-end”.

Native Americans also have their own way of pronouncing the “R.” They roll their tongue, which sometimes makes this phoneme more pronounced than those living in the United Kingdom. The most well-known case of this is phenomenon called “rhoticity” It is in the pronunciation of “water” that the British omit the letter “r”, which becomes something like ““Wow-okay” while Americans say “waa-tR”.

3. Spelling

The spelling of British English and American English are also very different from each other. While the British still maintain the spelling of each term much closer to the original and with a strong French influence, the Americans are based on speech and remove all letters that are not part of the way they pronounce the term.

Here are two everyday examples that clearly demonstrate this pruning of what is “unnecessary”. In British writing, the words “colour” and “honour” exist, but the letters “u” are not pronounced. Thus, the same words in American English become “colour” and “honour”, keeping only the letters that they actually pronounce.

See some more examples of this difference!

These are subtle changes, but by being aware of them, you avoid any misunderstandings caused by someone else thinking they don't know exactly what you mean.

4. Grammar

In addition to speech, writing and differences in word meanings, the English language undergoes grammatical changes from the United Kingdom to the United States. Some rules about Past Simple, for example, change. While Americans always use this verb tense to talk about something that happened recently, British people usually form these sentences in the Present Perfect.

If you want complete content about the English verb tenses, check out what we have already published here at blog!

By the same logic, sentences that would normally be constructed more formally in British English with the use of “shall”, they are inflected more informally with the use of “should” or “will” in the US.

Another grammatical rule that changes is the use of collective nouns: for Americans, these terms are considered singular, even if they express the idea of a group, as is the case with “the band” which would have its complement conjugated in the singular. For the English, the most used way in these cases is the plural inflection.

British or American English? Find out which one is best for you

We want to start by saying that there is no English that is “more correct” than another, there are only regional and cultural differences in the way of expressing oneself. However, we cannot ignore the fact that American English is currently much more popular than the British style.

Whether in film productions, music or even in extra study materials that you can find out there, there is much more content using the American accent than that of the United Kingdom. This may also be a consequence of the fact that the USA has become one of the greatest world powers, which makes many people want to travel to that territory and, to do so, study its way of expressing themselves.

That's why, even though there is no right or wrong pronunciation, Our recommendation is that you prioritize studying and improving your American English. This way, you will have an easier time making yourself understood by people of other nationalities who also speak that language, and you will also be able to easily understand the media you consume.

So, have you cleared up any doubts you may have about the differences between British and American English? In addition to clarifying important questions for students of another language, our blog is full of study tips, supplementary materials and other materials. Therefore, follow the contents of blog from CCAA and get closer to fluency every day!

Also check out what we've already talked about cognates in English and stay on top of this topic!