British vs American vs Canadian ENGLISH Differences! (very different!) (+ Free PDF & Quiz)

English teachers Rachel and Bob join me today for this vocabulary and accent comparison video: US vs UK vs Canadian English words! 📝 *GET THE FREE LESSON PDF* _here_ 👉🏼 bit.ly/VocabPDF WATCH PART 2 (pronunciation) HERE: bit.ly/UkUsCanACCENTS 📊 *FIND OUT YOUR ENGLISH LEVEL!* _Take my level test here_ 👉🏼 bit.ly/EnglishLevelTest12
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I love how the Canadian guy had a full story for every word and also offered up the US equivalent lol

This was so much fun! Thanks Lucy for inviting me to participate in this awesome English lesson!

Loving how Rachel just answers and Bob leaves you wanting a full conversation....

Bob, you did such a great job representing us Canadians. ❤️❤️🇨🇦

Actually, in Canada, though distance is officially measured in kilometers, we more often give distances in time (Montreal is five hours from Toronto, rather than Montreal is 540 kilometers from Toronto).

I love how Bob smiles everytime he's done speaking.
(Edited:Wow so many likes thank you guys)

It was great to have Madam Rachel, Mr Bob. It was heartwarming to see them explain their terminology. As an Indian, we have all mix of US, UK and Canadian terms. And I tell you interesting fact Lucy, most Hindi and other languages have incorporated most of the all three countries' terms. Regards

7:21 In Canada, we also determine the distance between two cities by saying the time it takes to travel from one to the other.

I love Bob. He really is the epitome of Canadian politeness

In my region of the US, we call the "popsicles" that come in bags "freeze pops" or "freezer pops." To qualify as a popsicle, it has to have a stick.

Growing up I didn’t exactly know which English we were taught at school. I only realized after coming to the US that my previous school taught British English (sans the accent lol). I learned to replace my vocabs from rubber to eraser, trousers to pants, rubbish to trash… and spell certain words differently like color instead of colour. I was also shocked to learn the American way of reading time was a lot simpler than the British, such as instead of half past four, it’s just four-thirty or instead of five past six, it’s six-oh-five (btw, the number 0 is usually read as oh, such as when referring to room numbers you would say room three-oh-four to refer to room 304). The American way of reading time was a relief for me since I sucked at the British way back then. But I love British accent while still appreciating the simplicity of American English and hopefully I’ll learn more about Canadian English.

The English Dialect is absolutely poetic. Simply love it.

Bob is from Southern Ontario. All of Bob's sayings were Ontario-centric (including his southern ontario accent).

As a Canadian, the only time I’ve ever heard someone say serviette is if they were speaking in French. I’ve always heard napkin in English. I live in Northern Ontario for reference.

I'm from Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. My answers:
1. Mostly zee, sometimes zed. I use zed when I'm spelling out something so it's not confused with D or B
2. Bill
3. Sneakers
4. Couch
5. 1 dollar 🤷🏽 we'd say single if referring to the bill itself and not the amount ("You have any singles?").
6. Soft drink is seen as most proper...see-drink or swee-drink (from "sweet drink" but no-one says sweet drink) is a dialectal form (idk the proper term to use there)
7. One kilometer. Also use 1k or 5k for running events etc.
8. Bachelor/bachelorette party
9. Eh (pronounced 'eh' as in 'egg') or ent (same soft e) which probably comes from innit since we were a British colony
10. Cigarettes
11. Pennacool (from "penny cool" cuz they used to cost a penny). We use to have a brand called Freezies. A lolly is the kind with the stick.
12. Milk? 🤷🏽
13. Car park (or multi storey car park but nobody says all those extra words for no reason😂) or parkade rarely
14. Bathroom, washroom, restroom, or toilet interchangeably. I've only ever heard water closet from old people.
15. Fire station
16. Electricity or current. When power goes out - "current gone"
17. Whole wheat bread
18. Napkin
19. Because of the packaging I would say 24 pack. We have actual, reusable hard plastic cases that bottled beer comes in but this kind in the cans would be a 24 pack, although I've only ever seen 6 packs sold like that.

I like how Bob tries to explain or give contexts to his answers.

Bob the Canadian is a rockstar! 🇨🇦

When Canada was switching to the metric system they showed us a way to convert from km to miles which is handy for converting to time. For example, drop the right-most digit (which is usually a zero) and multiply the rest by 6. So 100 km becomes 10 multiplied by 6 which equals 60 miles or 60 minutes.

Thanks for sharing different names to many objects in common. I love to watch my wonderful teacher Rachel and teacher Bob with you sharing this topic. Congratulations.

Interesting. Half of the stuff Bob says is so different than what I'm used to hear for almost 3 decades living here.

I saw Bob the Canadian I clicked. Love his good vibe and energy. =)

As someone from California I'd call the frozen ice things 'Otter Pops' , which is a brand but is used for all such single tube frozen treats. For me a 'popsicle' is a froze treat but it has to have a popsicle stick...a flat wooden handle sticking out of it so you can hold it. And in fact in craft stores they sell 'popsicle sticks' without the popsicle for doing projects.

Hi from Argentina!! I love your channel because My grandparents come frome England. When My father was a child, they talk only English at dinner time, tea time. He must to use that English shorts on school. He grown "like" in England, but in Patagonia.

In my experience on Canada’s west coast, people tend to say “bathroom” in a private residence, but “washroom” if it’s in a public place.

I would enjoy seeing these 3 along side Australian, Kiwi and South African English for comparison of all 6 at once.

As a new English learner, I watched your video with great pleasure. Although I live in Canada, I also learned things I had never heard of. Thank you for such a beautiful sharing.

A few points to build on Bob's great answers (as someone who has lived all over Ontario, but only in Ontario).
- a stag and doe is usually a party for the broader friends and family and often used to raise a bit of money, whereas a bachelor or bachelorette party is generally peers only and the aim is to be a bit more wild. I think Bob took the question in a particular direction different to Rachel.
- we use the word popsicle for ice-based treats on a stick, whereas freezie is used specifically for the plastic tube ice treat in the picture.
- we do say hydro (Bob's explanation is correct) when it doesn't make any real sense. We also say power, and definitely understand when someone says electricity.
- I learned the word serviette first, but as a millennial I have been made fun of regularly for this use. Saying 'napkin' seems to be more common in my experience. Also, I don't think I've ever heard a cloth napkin called a serviette, so serviette seems to be reserved for cheaper paper options.
Thanks for the great content!

Canadian here. Loved this video. Just one slight correction: the bird on the back of the one dollar coin is a loon, and thus extended to become a loonie.

American here, originally from Long Island, New York.
I did some research into why we pronounce the letter Z as "zee," rather than "zed" and where the pronunciation originated. Believe it or not, we actually inherited it from England.
At one point in history, "zee" was used as an alternative pronunciation for the letter Z in England. When the English first colonized what is now the United States, the alternative pronunciation made its way over to the colonies, so for a long time, both "zed" and "zee" were used in the U.S., depending on what area a person was from, or if the person inherited the pronunciation from their parents.
"Zed" began to fall out of use in the U.S. when Noah Webster, an American lexicographer, wrote "An American Dictionary of the English Language." In it, he listed the correct pronunciation for the letter Z as "zee." In addition, American music publisher Charles Bradlee, who wrote the A.B.C. (alphabet) song, chose the pronunciation of "zee" because it rhymed with the rest of the song.
Q-R-S
T-U "VEE"
W-X
Y and "ZEE"
These things helped to popularize "zee" to the point that it just became the proper way to pronounce the letter Z in the U.S. and what was taught in every school. There's your history lesson for the day. Now the question remains, why did "zee" fall out of use in British English?

Canada is so diverse with accents and slang, I’m from the east coast and I would say we have more in common with Rachel’s english than with Bob’s.
Where I’m from:
-It’s probably 50/50 with zee vs zed
-Definitely sneakers not runners
-For KMs we would say 5k, 5 clicks, or 5 miles (yes even though we mean kms)
-Definitely say bachelor or bachelorette party. Never heard of stag and doe or jack & jill
-Rarely ever hear “eh” here, I think it’s an Ontario thing
-Never heard of homo milk, we’d say whole milk
-Washroom or bathroom, never restroom.
-Never heard electricity referred to as “hydro” but we would say “power bill” or “electricity bill”
-Napkin, I think maybe older folks say serviette? I haven’t heard it in years
Hopefully that sheds a little more light on Canada being even more diverse than some might suspect. 🙂

Bob was speaking for the Mid or Eastern parts of Canada. British Columbia in the west, have a few different names for some of those articles. ❤🇨🇦

I love this battle of language accents. Thank you

As a French-Canadian that only spoke fluent English around age 15-16 (when I started college at McGill), then lived in the UK for year, then moved to the US... My English is a serious hodge-podge of miscellaneous words and expressions! So I really enjoyed this video! Thanks Lucy, love your charm & wit!

I was born in Toronto and lived there till I was 13, my mother is from London, England and I’ve lived in the southern USA for the past 14 years. This whole video about made me pass out trying to figure out why every single thing you guys said sounded correct 😂

In the U.S. military, in map orientation, and communication of troop movements, we use the term klick. It also means kilometers. As in, “Your objective is 10 klicks north of your position.”

As an English raised Canadian living in Florida half the year , This is a great little vid!

11:11 whaaaat? 😮 I'm Canadian and those have always been "freezies" to me. Just thinking about them fills me with nostalgia. Every summer here growing up, us kids would take a break from playing outside in the heat and go inside for a bit to have some freezies. I actually had no idea Brits and Americans call them popsicles. In Canada, the word "popsicle" only refers to a frozen flavoured and sugary treat with a stick in it. Hence the term "popsicle sticks". But freezies don't have sticks in them, they're literally just plastic tubes filled with sweet, frozen, artificially flavoured and coloured syrup 🤣🤣

Being a western Canadian I can tell that Bob is somewhere from eastern Canada. In the west we tend to have more American speech influence and less French influence. For example, I rarely ever hear the word serviette. It is always a napkin. I also know from experience that Canadians on the east coast have a large number of variations on their speech that differ from anywhere else in Canada. East coast dialect is where a number of Canadian stereotypes originate from.

In the American Midwest, a couch or sofa is often called a 'davenport,' particularly in Iowa and Nebraska.

Milk is mostly called blue top for full milk, green top for semi skimmed and red top for skimmed. The best milk is gold top or Jersey milk.

I always enjoy these, but I have to say there is so much regional and/or generational difference in the US that frankly you could do an entire series just on those.

I love the fact that we in Canada use British spelling which can actually save money. For example, in my province of New Brunswick ( the one officially bilingual one), we use the British spelling of "centre" which is also the French spelling so rather than make 2 signs for "City Center" and then "Centre Ville" we simply put "City Centre Ville". Saves space and money.

The used to be a chain of stores in Canada called Zellers (the brand has been revised). The radio jingle went ‘Zellers, that’s what we said! Zellers, with a capital Zed!’ Reminding all Canadians how to properly pronounce the letter.

Canada is a large country with many distinct regions, so when Bob says "In Canada we say..." he is actually speaking Torontonian. For example, in Canada we call bathrooms: bathrooms, restrooms, washrooms, or toilets, depending where we live. But people from Toronto tend to think all Canadians speak the same way - just like they do in Toronto. Not so!

I'm a native Spanish speaker and I lived in England for twelve years. Then I moved to the US and sometimes it felt like learning a new language. Some people would correct my pronunciation sometimes and I often thought I had mispronounced the word because English is not my first language, but after double checking the pronunciation in a dictionary, I would realise that I had pronounced it with an English accent (herb, nauseous, water, etc)

I'm a Chinese American from California. While I visited Syndey, Australia it was so interesting (and funny) seeing Chinese Australians speaking with an Aussie accent and vice versa. Our Cantonese was the same though. Same thing in London, England and Montreal. Bob's Canadian accent seems not so different than my own. I thought it would have been more interesting to compare say... an Australian, Scottish or Welsh accent. I never heard of a serviette, and I thought chesterfield is a brand of cigarettes.

I'm passionate for your accent!
Thanks for this awesome video!

Milk in bags is totally a thing in Canada, but it's regional. You'll see it in Ontario, New Brunswick, I think Nova Scotia, PEI, and parts of Quebec, as well. It's not sold in bags in Newfoundland and Labrador, and western Canada, nor (I think) the territories.

This is eastern Canada, there is a lot of variation when you head west, lots of terms like hydro, stag and doe and serviette aren't the norm in places like Saskatchewan.

You asked about the pronunciation of “about”. Well it differs across Canada. In the East, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia or PEI you may still hear “aboot “ but that is changing since more people from out West migrate. It’s kind of an old pronunciation. We also used to pronounce “roof” differently between the East and West. West was more an “oof” sound and East more an “uff” sound.

It is sooo interesting how we, as Afrikaans mother tounge speakerss in South Africa, learned a complete mixture of British and American English vocab at school.

I think Bob needs to explain that he speaks more for Ontario than he does for Canada, I've lived on both sides of the country and rarely hear some of his stated choice words. Other than that, great video.

Every time Bob stops talking he ends with a smile

Something to note; Bob is from Eastern Canada, and there is a slight difference between Eastern and Western speech habits. For example, here in Western Canada, we'd say "napkin", "couch", "bathroom", "power" (though that's more of a prairie provinces word. On the east and west coasts, hydro is more common."

I would like to thank you to all these participants for this. As you know some of us do not know why this word spells different in american english, why this spells in british or why this in canadian english.But watching this video we can clear our doubt. I really appreciate all you guys. Thanks a lot. 👍

I am Canadian born and raised (Ontario). I have now lived over half my life in various parts of the US, both North and South and have traveled East and West. I believe Bob's accent/vocabulary is typical of Ontario. One of my sisters has spent the majority of her adult life in northern Newfoundland. I could not understand my nephews over the telephone LOL. Their accent, vocabulary and idioms were very regional.
So there can be some very distinct differences in the English language in Canada as you see in the US.

I'm Puerto Rican and you're not alone concerning the mixed use of miles and kilometers. We measure speed in mph, but distance between towns is in kilometers. Also, weather is measured in F but body temperature is measured in either C or F. Milk is sold in liters, half-gallons and gallons. Fuel is sold in liters. We definiteily need to sort this out, hahaha!

Great video ,I am from Egypt and learned English via RP British English , but I hear and watch a lot of American accent through media ,the Candian one was very interesting as it has more similarities with the British one ..!

Thank you very much! Great job. I learn English on your channel. It helps me a lot in my profession.

I'm Canadian, but I tend to use a mix of all three versions of English. Some Canadian words Bob mentions, I've never heard of like the "stag and doe" or "jack and jill". Very interesting...

I'm surprised Rachel didn't mention "soft drink" as another name for "soda" and "pop". I usually say "soda", but in the southern US, lots of folks either call it by its proper name or say "soft drink".

I grew up in Central Florida, too!
Love the words you use!
😊

Even in the UK there can be quite a few differences. Speaking for Northern Ireland, we might say "minerals" for fizzy drinks (I'd guess that's derived from mineral water). A soda is short for a soda farl, which is a small loaf of soda bread (a local speciality), or a sandwich made from soda farl, which is quite substantial! That one can be quite a source of amusement for us when listening to how non-locals use the word soda.
A multi-storey car park here is just a multi-storey.
Brown bread here is often called wholemeal.

It is interesting that Bob used clicks as a "slang word" for kilometer. A click is a (US American) military term for distance, wich is also a kilometer long.

As an Asian English learner who’ve been learning English for my whole life, just found out that I mixed everything up 😂

This is kind of crazy. I'm from Finland and I've spoken english every day for the last 10 years at work. I've almost never heard anyone speaking Canadian accent but for some reason from these three it feels like the most natural :D No idea what's that all about.

As for long distances, in Quebec, we tend to swap length for time…
I guess it is based on the assumption you travel at 100 km/h.
So we tend to say: « Montreal-Quebec City ride is about 2.5 hours »

I was the 1st US born of my Canadian family, so it was really neat hearing the all of them together. My Grandfather was born in the UK too, so I grew up with a delicious combination. This was great fun to watch 😃

In the US, we use the term “buck” for a dollar because during colonial times, we used to barter quite regularly. And one item to barter with were deer pelts. Generally a male deer (buck) pelt was worth about the same as 1 dollar. So, you could pay with a dollar, or a buck-skin.

Loved this video, thank you so much!!!

Hello Lucy,
I listened to this with much interest. Believe it or not, my background is the same as your American citizen: I was raised in Florida, lived in Philadelphia, family moved to Massachusetts, and spent a good deal of time in New York.
I've resided in Alaska for over 30 years now. Being originally from Florida, I was surprised to learn of he Canadian propensity of saying "eh". I say that because my Mom and her brother always said it, as do I!
One more: Regarding fizzy drinks, the terms run the gamut in America. It's regional: in New England, it's tonic. North midwest, it's pop. West, soda pop. South, soda! Another area calls the Cokes, no matter the flavour!
An aside: The very first time I took a shoot a set drink, I looked at Mommy in dismay and proclaimed, 'they call these soft drinks'? I wondered what could be stronger! As a result I've consumed less than 12 in my entire life. Just don't care for the sensation.

I find this endlessly interesting. Words often have historical roots that only the word itself keeps alive, as traditions and ways of life change.

As an English teacher, and as a vocabulary lover, I really appreciate when native English speakers make videos on this topic. Thank you.

Hi Lucy we love ur chanel it’s what inspired me to learn British and I’ve finally nailed it I’ve tried every Chanel bur non of them helped but u inspired me and I’ve finally. Nailed the British accent and me I’m half way through I’ll watch more of ur vocabulary vedios and learn the accent we love ur Chanel ❤

6. Some parts of the US refer to all soda pop as “coke” even if not referring to Coca-Cola.
12. Milk in Canada is more commonly sold skimmed, so homogenized milk is uncommon but actually has less fat than the whole milk of the US. Also bagged milk is uniquely for 4L units of milk in Eastern Canada.

Eastern Canada and western Canada have different accents. Never discussed.

I think a lot of this is regional based, not necessarily that the entire country uses the same words.

Great video! Thoroughly enjoyed it!

I like the way bob says stories with is names 16:12

I beg to differ on Rachel’s “electricity” reference. In the US we generally refer to electricity as “power.” For example: power bill, power lines, power outage, power’s on/off, and etc. That’s not to say there aren’t regional differences.

I really love it every time when Bob tries to elaborate, and makes some examples about the picture and the topic. Appreciate it.

I'm new to Canada, but every day I hear "kilo'méters" on the CBC radio weather broadcasts, vs the US kilòmeters. Which is absolutely correct, nano-méters, milli-méters, deci-méters etc.

What a beautiful person and easy to listen to 👍

As someone from the United States, I find this incredibly interesting. Thank you, Lucy!

Glad I stumbled across this video. I am a Canadian but I went to school in Engand for a year when I was 12-13. We lived on the Bedfordshire/Buckinghamshire border in the delightfully named town of Leighton-Buzzard, which of course, my Canadian friends immediately referred to as Buzzard, England. It took me three months to get used to British English and actually, I soon realized that there were SO MANY different accents in England. This is also when I first became aware of the fact that as a Canadian, I had an accent! Canadians always think we don't have accents (except for Newfoundland - but that was part of the UK until 1949) although we think most Americans have strong accents, and spell certain words incorrectly, like colour or flavour or centre. However I soon learned that our retail giant Canadian Tire was an affront to the English language, at least in England! I also couldn't understand what my classmates were saying when they greeted me every morning. Oi! Watcha' Mate! Well, is that a question or a statement and what the hell does it mean? Watch my what?! My back?! Haha, eventually I figured it out. Fascinating though. The following year when I returned to Canada I had actually picked up a slight English accent and the first week of school I got the nickname Limey! Anyways, as fate would have it, I ended up becoming an English teacher abroad for many years in Japan and later China and Vietnam. I like to think the curiosity that led to that started with my experiences in England. Language is fascinating! Keep up the great work!

for me as a swedish person speaking fluent english i use both british and american english with swedish accent wich is pretty fun. in school we learn british english but ive learned myself fluent english trough playing games and youtube. so some words i pronounce in british and some in american with a swedish/british accent

Very informative. Thanks a lot for sharing!

I'm from England and I'm english!
Zed.
Cheque
Trainers.
Settee.
1 pound/ quid
Fizzy pop
Kilometers
Stag hen
Innit
Fags
Icey pop
Full FAT milk
Car lot
Water room
fire station
electricity
Brown bread
Napkin
24 pack
This was so fun doing this with you guys! I love your videos where you have the price to teach people.

Here in Brazil, some milks comes in bags as well. They're called "leite de saquinho" (bagged milk), and have different processes to warm it up, conserving some bacteria, like Lactobacillos in it's composition.
The standard milk, called "leite de caixinha" (milk in a box, or boxed milk) have zero bacteria in it, increasing it's longevity but also turning it less wealthy

I agree with many of the comments made about Bob’s english, that he’s using very specific southern Ontario terms and accent. I’m from Saskatchewan and I’ve never used terms like “hydro” “serviette” or “two four.”

Mil gracias por tan importante enseñanza, éxitos por siempre Lucyy, saludos desde 🇵🇦 Panamá. Im learning a lot with your coursses. thanks a lot. God bless you, regards.

In the American South coke is used as a general term for all carbonated soft drinks.

In the Southern US, you will often hear people call a soda / pop a "coke," even if it is not specifically a Coca-Cola. This led to some confusion when I first moved here and had conversations like this: "Would you like a coke?"... "Yes, please!"... "OK, what kind? I have Sprite, Mountain Dew, or Pepsi." 😂

Slight correction: the bird on the Canadian $1 coin is a Loon, and that’s why we call it a Loonie (with an ie, not an ey), and which led to the logical conclusion of calling the $2 coin a toonie (some might spell it twonie, but that just seems wrong to me, and the Bank of Canada officially spells it toonie).

In US we call it soda or coke (regardless of brand). Pop sounds like a pop-sickle.
“Right?” is also “ain’t it?”
A garage has a roof/shelter over it. A parking lot is open air.
“Restroom” is in a business or public space. A “bathroom” is in the private house.

Now do this with South African, Australian and New Zealand accents. So many people have difficulty with determing the differences.
Good idea Lucy. I love languages and especially your channel. Thankx.

The word "Clicks" for kilometers is also used in the U.S. military jargon.

Americans absolutely say "k" for marathons and races. 10K, etc.

Eastern U.S. here.
Sometimes “fire station” is used in conversation that focuses on fire-fighting and equipment. But “fire hall” is used more in conversations about any social/civic/fund raising/community activities done within that SAME building. “Bingo at the fire hall”, or “Chicken BBQ fundraiser at the fire hall”, “Benefit silent auction at the fire hall”, etc.