Two-thirds of American millennials do not know what Auschwitz is while more than one in five are unsure if they have heard of the Holocaust, a study in the United States has found. 

The research, commissioned by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany and published to mark Holocaust Memorial Day, found younger US adults were less likely to be able to identify concentration camps, ghettos or even countries where the Nazi genocide took place.  

22 per cent of young adults said they had not heard or were not sure if they had heard of the Holocaust, while a share approaching half — 41 per cent — believes less than two million Jews were killed in the death camps. 

The true figure is six million. 

When asked about countries in which the Holocaust took place, a large share (84 per cent) of those surveyed identified Germany, but only 37 per cent named Poland, where more than half of the Jews exterminated came from. 

However survey participants expressed a desire to learn, with more than two-thirds (68 per cent) accepting antisemitism still existed in the United States.   

“We are alarmed that today’s generation lacks some of the basic knowledge about these atrocities,” Claims Conference President Julius Berman said in a statement. 

The group’s executive vice president, Greg Schneider, said the study’s findings highlighted the importance of Holocaust education. 

“There remain troubling gaps in Holocaust awareness while survivors are still with us; imagine when there are no longer survivors here to tell their stories,” Mr Schneider said. 

“We must be committed to ensuring the horrors of the Holocaust and the memory of those who suffered so greatly are remembered, told and taught by future generations.”