What is the accent you’re most attracted to? A gorgeous Irish lilt? A rakish Spanish inflexion? The King’s English, perhaps? Well, according to language learning platform Babbel, it’s official: French is no longer the world's sexiest accent. That bold statement will come as a disappointment to many, especially since Babbel previously polled more than 15,000 people in 2017, a group who named French the “sexiest accent”.

So, who has dethroned la belle langue française? Well, 6,000 people from the UK, France, Spain, Italy and Germany, as well as the US, were asked to rate which languages are perceived as “most sexy,” “most romantic” and “most passionate.” The findings stated that Italian was perceived by most to be “most sexy” and the “most romantic” by the highest number of people involved in the study.