In honor of the 90th Annual Scripps National Spelling Bee this week, Google shared a graphic of the most misspelled words in every state.
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The map, however, shows the most-searched spellings by state based on Google Trends data between January and April 2017, revealing the words residents of each state search “how to spell” the most.
Credit: Google
Credit: Google
While unsurprising commonly misspelled words such as “beautiful” and “pneumonia” topped the list, some Americans had a tough time with more basic words like “nanny” or “liar.”
But neither are as embarrassing as Wisconsin’s most misspelled word — their own state name.
And as for Georgia, where Google deemed residents have trouble spelling the word “gray,” critics are pointing out both “grey” and “gray” are acceptable spellings.
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According to Merriam-Webster and Dictionary.com, "gray" is more popular in the U.S. and "grey" is more commonly used in the UK.
As always, Twitter users responded with some sass, helpful advice, possible explanations and, of course, outright embarrassment.
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If some of your embarrassing “how to spell” Google searches are on this list, don’t worry. Even the geniuses at Google make mistakes.
In fact, in their first tweet revealing the list of 2017’s most commonly misspelled words in America, the company misspelled Maryland’s most misspelled word, “ninety.”
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