Aside from X and Z what is the most underused letter in the english alphabet (when typing in English)?

Question

Interested by this as 'p' is the most satisying button to press on my blackberry (it being in the top right corner of my keypad) but I very rarely seem to use it.

Answer 1

zlevad is certainly right about the bottom four. The question is, which of these is less frequent? Different folks come up with different answers based on the method they use. But I think this order, laid out in the link below, makes most sense:

z, q, j, x

http://pages.central.edu/emp/LintonT/classes/spring01/cryptography/letterfreq.html

(Interesting, that means that the Scrabble points -- 10 for z and q, 8 for j and x-- have a solid basis.)

The method for the link above was to actually count letters from a variety of sample texts -- the language IN USE. Others have simply done things like count up how often each letter appears in a list of words (esp in the dictionary). The problem with that approach is that it pays no attention to how often each word is actually USED!

For example, the list on the following page specifically states that it is based on a list of base words, without any regard for which words are more common -
http://www.rinkworks.com/words/letterfreq.shtml

(Note that it comes up with two answers different from the one above, but still the same four letters at the end.)

Answer 2

It depends on the subject being written about (bad English!) In English, it's the letter 'z'. See this link for other languages:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_frequencies#Relative_frequencies_of_letters_in_the_English_language

EDIT: Americans use 'z' a lot where Brits use 's' for things ending in 'ised' and 'ising', so I'm clearly referrring to Brit. Eng.

Answer 3

whilst you evaluate that premadona "S" is the form of glory hound, as though it does not have adequate of its very own sound, it needs to decrease in on Z's territory. It took the eastern to grant us Dragon ball Z to get issues a splash back in stability.

Answer 4

As any Scrabble player will point out, Z, Q, X, J are high scoring letters because they are not so common.

Answer 5

Sure could be p, but how about c and I´m thinking of w too. I don´t really know, just guessing.

Answer 6

I rarely ever use Q.Weird huh???

Answer 7

Probably w and y