Leg / Egg [pronunciation] (2025)

Do you say it like "Layg" (like the word "lay") or like "Lehg" (like the word "beg")? So basically, does the middle part of the word sound like "ay" or like "beg"? Same problem goes with "Egg".

I used cambridge online dictionary and it sounds like layg to me.

Here is a relevant previous thread: egg [pronunciation]
It includes discussion of regional variations.

The Wiki article on Pacific Northwest English says:

/ɛ/, and, in the northern Pacific Northwest, /æ/, become [eɪ] before the voiced velar plosive /ɡ/: egg and leg are pronounced as ayg and layg, a feature shared by many northern Midwestern dialects and with the Utah accent. In addition, sometimes bag will be pronounced bayg.
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Cagey said:

Here is a relevant previous thread: egg [pronunciation]
It includes discussion of regional variations.

The Wiki article on Pacific Northwest English says:

/ɛ/, and, in the northern Pacific Northwest, /æ/, become [eɪ] before the voiced velar plosive /ɡ/: egg and leg are pronounced as ayg and layg, a feature shared by many northern Midwestern dialects and with the Utah accent. In addition, sometimes bag will be pronounced bayg.
​

Click to expand...

As a longtime resident of the Pacific Northwest, I'm gobsmacked that I've never noticed this peculiarity.

I'll have to do some research.

sdgraham said:

As a longtime resident of the Pacific Northwest, I'm gobsmacked that I've never noticed this peculiarity.

I'll have to do some research.

Click to expand...

Maybe you aren't the one who needs to do more research, but Wiki is.

In a misbegotten effort to simplify matters, I omitted to mention that in the thread linked to above, a poster from Washington also denies that he has ever heard the 'ayg' pronunciation.

Skydown, are you thinking of an accent of English in my region (Singapore, Malaysia)? It is not uncommon here for egg, leg, red and bed to have the vowel in made, different from the one in west or bend. In most of the rest of the English-speaking world, they have the same vowel.

I've listened to the version of egg in the Cambridge Dictionary. I don't think it sounds like ayg.

Thanks for the Answers. I also listened to the pronounciation of "Leg" from Word Reference Dictionary and I campared the pronounciation with the one from Cambridge Dictionary. To me, they are very different. WR Dictionary is [lɛɡ] and Cambridge Dictionary sounds like "layg" or something between "leg" and 'layg".

natkretep said:

Skydown, are you thinking of an accent of English in my region (Singapore, Malaysia)? It is not uncommon here for egg, leg, red and bed to have the vowel in made, different from the one in west or bend. In most of the rest of the English-speaking world, they have the same vowel.

I've listened to the version of egg in the Cambridge Dictionary. I don't think it sounds like ayg.

Click to expand...

Topic question: What's the accent that pronounces "leg" as "leig", and "egg" as "eigg"?
Added by Cagey, moderator.

I often hear American people pronounce this way. Is it an accent? I can only think of these two words but are there more? (I assume the number of them are limited, because obviously they don't pronounce let as leit, etc)

Thanks!

Newer question added to earlier discussion.
Cagey, moderator

Here's a previous discussion on the topic: Leg / Egg [pronunciation]

The short answer is: the Pacific Northwest, particularly the Seattle area, the Upper Midwest (Minnesota and Wisconsin)* and Canada, especially Western Canada. In that older thread, sdgraham insists that he, an Oregonian, has never heard anyone in the Pacific Northwest speak like this. I, a Seattle native, have heard this so-called "bag-beg" merger, but not too commonly.

Here's a paper on the subject: Bag, beg, bagel: Prevelar raising and merger in Pacific Northwest English | Department of Linguistics | University of Washington

Before the 1970s, most people moving to Washington were born in the Midwest: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...eople-in-each-state-were-born.html#Washington