Kana pronunciation

Kunyomi vs. Onyomi

Tofugu’s Learn Kana Quiz

On'yomi (音読み, [âm độc], lit. "sound(-based) reading", đọc kiểu Hán), or the Sino-Japanese reading, is the reading of a kanji based on the historical Chinese pronunciation of the character.
On => PhỒN thể âm đọc

Kun'yomi (訓読み, Japanese pronunciation: [huấn độc], lit. 'explanatory reading', đọc kiểu Nhật) is the way of reading kanji characters using the native Japanese word that matches the meaning of the Chinese character when it was introduced.

Hiragana

Hiragana and Katakana are two Japanese syllabaries. Syllabary = each character represent a single syllable sound. Each character can only have one pronunciation.

syllable = consonant + vowel (a, i, u, e, o)

「ん」 is the only character with only consonant (n) and no vowel sound.

Dakuten - Voiced consonants in Hiragana

This dakuten symbol marks hiragana from certain consonant columns and changes their pronunciation. It turns the consonant into a "voiced" or "vibrating" sound, which just means your vocal cords vibrate when the sound is made.

Q: ぢ and じ sound very similar with the dakuten, how do you know which one to use? A: Most of the time, we use じ, ぢ is seldom used in Japanese. ぢ is only used for compound country Kanji which have ぢ as their original sound.

There is no dakuten version of なにぬねの (N-colums) and M-columns because the N sound and M sound are already voiced.

Han-dakuten (semi-voiced consonant)

The H-column is a bit strange. It has two different kinds of symbols that can be applied to it. One is the regular dakuten — that "quotes" symbol you've seen so far. The other is called han-dakuten, a little circle like this → ゜. This han-dakuten makes phonetically voiceless sounds: unlike voiced sounds (dakuten sounds), your vocal cords don't vibrate when you make them. Han-dakuten only applies to H sounds and turn them into P sounds so it should be easy to remember, though.

Digraph in Hiragana (combination Hiragana)

Japanese Digraphs [consonant + “i” vowel + や, ゆ, よ (small)] (“digraph” chứ không phải “diagraph” nha ba. Nghĩa khác nhau hoàn toàn).

There is another set of syllables in Japanese which is form by adding the や/ゆ/よ sounds to a consonant ending with the “i” sound kana from the い row (that includes き, し, じ, に, etc). In these syllables, や/ゆ/よ are written smaller. In other words, what we are combining are these two elements:

Kana from the い (I) row:
This also means kana that end with an I-sound when written in romaji, which are: き (ki) - し (shi) - ち (chi) - に (ni) - ひ (hi) - み (mi) - り (ri) - ぎ (gi) - じ (ji) - ぢ (ji) - び (bi) - ぴ (pi) Note the vowel い itself won't apply here!

The small ゃ - ゅ - ょ
The small versions of や (ya) - ゆ (yu) - よ (yo).

Japanese digraphs are pronounced without the “i” sound. They are written smaller and they are pronounced by “gliding” to the Y sound and not pronouncing the “i” sound

Now you know what to combine, here's how to combine them. What's important in this process is you drop the I-sound that comes from the い-row kana. For example:

き + ゃ → KIYA → KYA じ + ょ → JIYO → JYO

See how the "i" gets dropped and it just becomes one syllable of sound? Here's a list of them all:
きゃ、きゅ、きょ　→　KYA, KYU, KYO
ぎゃ、ぎゅ、ぎょ　→　GYA, GYU, GYO\

⭐ しゃ、しゅ、しょ　→　SHA, SHU, SHO/SYO
じゃ、じゅ、じょ　→　JYA, JYU, JYO (or JA, JU, JO)

⭐ ちゃ、ちゅ、ちょ　→　CHA, CHU, CHO/CYO

⭐ ぢゃ、ぢゅ、ぢょ　→　DYA (not DA), DYU, DYO (you'll never see these, pretty much ever). du-> づ

にゃ、にゅ、にょ　→　NYA, NYU, NYO ひゃ、ひゅ、ひょ　→　HYA, HYU, HYO びゃ、びゅ、びょ　→　BYA, BYU, BYO ぴゃ、ぴゅ、ぴょ　→　PYA, PYU, PYO みゃ、みゅ、みょ　→　MYA, MYU, MYO りゃ、りゅ、りょ　→　RYA, RYU, RYO

Small tsu (つ) - Chiisai tsu

The “ちいさいつ” (Chīsaitsu) (small つ) is a smaller size つ. The small tsu itself doesn't have a sound. It is used to double the consonant that comes after it. The consonant after a small っ is written twice when writing in romaji. When found at the end of the word, the small つ acts like a glottal stop. Let's take a look at how the following hiragana converts to romaji. したい → shitai しったい → shit_tai

かこ → kako かっこ → kak_ko

いた　→　ita いった　→　it_ta See how that worked? したい is just plain "shitai" without the small っ. But when you add it in, it becomes shittai. The small っ that comes before the "ta" causes the consonant to double, making it "shit_tai." Make sure you understand how that works with kako/kakko too.

いしょ → isho いっしょ → ish_sho

How to type chiisai tsu

1. ‘l’ or ‘x’ before ‘tsu’ and any other small Character

You can actually type all small characters by proceeding them with ‘l’ or ‘x’. So, 「ぁ、ぃ、ぅ、ぇ、ぉ、ゃ、ゅ、ょ、ヵ、ヶ、ゎ」could be types like “la, li, lu, le, lo, lya, lyu, lyo, lka, lke, lwa” or “xa, xi, xu, xe, xo, xya, xyu, xyo, xka, xke, xwa”.

Cách 2: Type the same Consonant twice

If you want to type 「にっぽん」then you would type ‘N’, ‘I’, ‘P’, ‘P’, ‘O’, ‘N’. Anytime you type small tsu within a word just type the same consonant twice. Another example 「けっこん」”Marriage”, you would type ‘K’, ‘E’, ‘K’, ‘K’, ‘O’, ‘N’. If you want to say 「きった」”cut”, you would type ‘K’, ‘I’, ‘T’, ‘T’, ‘A’. In order to type「こっち」” this way” you would type, ‘K’, ‘O’, ‘C’, ‘C’, ‘H’, ‘I’.

Pronunciation notes

え pronounce là ‘e’ in ‘egg, ehh!’ ko phải ‘ê’ => tất cả syllables có vowel ‘e’ mình đều phát âm sai hết đó

け is just the K sound plus え, making a ke sound. It's pronounced like ke in "kelp."

し is just the SH sound plus い, making a “shi” sound. It's pronounced like shee in "sheep" ち is just the CH sound plus い, making a chi sound. It's pronounced like chee in "cheese." つ is just the TS sound plus う, making a tsu sound. It's pronounced like tsu in "tsunami." ふ is halfway between the F and H sounds, plus う, making a fu / hu sound. It's pronounced like a softly blown-out version of foo in "fool," or sometimes hoo in "hoop." を is pronounced like o in "origami" — just like the vowel お. It used to be pronounced like "wo," but now it sounds exactly like お. Why two kana for the o sound, you wonder? Unlike お, を is primarily used as a grammar element called a "particle." It marks the object of a sentence. Pronouncing the ‘R’ sound can be tricky: src

Take a look at ぢ and づ again. Although they used to be pronounced differently (more like "dzi" and "dzu"), nowadays, ぢ and づ are pronounced exactly like じ and ず. However, in written form, they're still used for sounds that originated from ち and つ. So bear in mind that if you want to type ぢ and づ, you'll need to type "di" and "du" — not "zi" and "zu."

Typing notes

し - shi |じ - ji じゃ - jya/ja | しゃ - sya (shya)

ち - chi | ぢ - di (pronounce zi) ぢゅ - dyu not ‘du (づ)’ | ぢゃ - dya not ‘da (だ)’ ちゅ - cyu つ - tsu | づ - du (pronounce zu) ふ - fu | ぶ - bu | ぷ - pu を - wo ざ - za

じゃない - jyanai/janai

Katakana

Katakana dakuten

For the most part, if you know hiragana's dakuten, you know katakana's dakuten. Just as a refresher:

But, there are some katakana out there that you can dakuten that aren't the standard fare.

⭐ ウ　→　ヴ (VU/BU)

Actually, many Japanese speakers aren't used to pronouncing the "V" sound, so it often comes out as a "BU" sound. That's as close as they can get. But, when you combine that with some small katakana (next section), we can make a sound that almost, but not quite, sounds like a "V".

Digraph in Katakana (Combination Katakana)

Just like with hiragana, you can combine small katakana with big katakana to make new sounds. It gets a little trickier with katakana though. Let's start with the part you do know (from the hiragana guide) first:

• キャ、キュ、キョ = KYA, KYU, KYO
• ギャ、ギュ、ギョ = GYA, GYU, GYO
• シャ、シュ、ショ = SHA, SHU, SHO
• ジャ、ジュ、ジョ = JYA, JYU, JYO (or JA, JU, JO)

(⭐) チャ、チュ、チョ = CHA, CHU, CHO Ex: チャンネル (Youtube) Channel

ヂャ、ヂュ、ヂョ = JYA, JYU, JYO (Type DYA, DYU, DYO respectively)
Nếu type do thì sẽ thành ド

• ニャ、ニュ、ニョ = NYA, NYU, NYO
• ヒャ、ヒュ、ヒョ = HYA, HYU, HYO
• ビャ、ビュ、ビョ = BYA, BYU, BYO
• ピャ、ピュ、ピョ = PYA, PYU, PYO
• ミャ、ミュ、ミョ = MYA, MYU, MYO
• リャ、リュ、リョ = RYA, RYU, RYO

With katakana, combinations don't stop here. It gets… weird. In addition to the basic combination katakana above (which are I-row sounds + ャ/ュ/ョ), you can combine some of the U-row sounds and the 5 small vowels ァィゥェォ. This is used a lot more in katakana than hiragana because there are many sounds commonly used in non-Japanese languages that katakana needs to try to account for. The most interesting example of this is the V-sounds made by ヴ + small vowels:

• ヴァ = BWA (Va)
• ヴィ = BWI (Vi)
• ヴェ = BWE (Ve)
• ヴォ = BWO (Vo)

These combination katakana listed above are used for representing the V-sounds (like, "visual" can be written as ヴィジュアル). Since the V-sounds don't really exist in the Japanese language, ヴァ, ヴィ, ヴェ, and ヴォ sound more like the BW-sounds.

In addition to the V-sounds, there are W-sounds that need to be added in as well. As you know, the kana only cover わ (wa) and を, and を isn't really a sound that's used, it's only used as a particle. So, to make up for the missing W-sounds, you combine ウ + small vowels:

ウィ = Wi like "window"
ウェ = We like "Wednesday"; スウェーデン (Sweden)

⭐ ウォ = Wo like "worry"; type uxo) because wo = ヲ
ウォーティ: water

The third big set is the F-sounds. You can combine フ (fu) + small vowels to make all the other F-sounds you need:

• ファ = FA like "fax"
• フィ = FI like "fish"
• フ (fu)
• フェ = FE like "fence"
• フォ = FO like "fox" | ho ホ

And, there's also ツ (tsu) + small vowels. This set is relatively less common, but is often used for transcribing Italian Z-sounds like モッツァレラ (Mozzarella) as well as Chinese TS- or TZ-sounds. Note that you use "ts" for typing:

ツァ = TZA/TSA (Type TSA) ツィ = TZI/TSI (Type TSI) ツェ = TZE/TSE (Type TSE) ツォ = TZO/TSO (Type TSO)

Besides these sets, there are also a few more scattered sounds you can make with combination katakana. The rest are: シェ = SHE like "shell" シェフ (chef), シェア (share). The "SH" sound: しゃ (sha), し (shi), しゅ (shu), シェ (she), しょ (sho). ジェ = JE like "jelly" in ジェリー (jelly) and ウィジェット (widget).

チェ = CHE like "check" チ is the only character that produce the “CH” sound in Japanese. The digraph チェ (che) allows Japanese to say words like チェア (chair) and アーチェリー (archery) ちゃ (cha), ち (chi), ちゅ (chu), チェ (che), ちょ (cho)

Since ta-chi-tsu-te-to không có âm ti nên dùng テ + vowel. Example: ティ = TI like "party", type thi or te xi because ti = チ (chi). Just like that, for ディ (di), you must type dhi. Example: ミーティング (meeting).

Just like there is no native ti syllable in Japanese, there also isn’t a tu syllable (because ツ is pronounced "tsu" not "tu"). Therefore, the digraph トゥ (tu, type twu or to xu; nếu type tu thì thành ツ). Adding dakuten to トゥ and we get ドゥ (“du” sound, type dwu).

• ドゥ = dwu like "dew" | ヅ (du)
• ディ = DI like in: "candy, ready" (Type dhi) | Compare with ヂ (di)
• イェ = Ye or i xe

If you want to type the small characters, you need to put x or l before the Kana. ex) イェ→ixe/ile Notice that these are not using sounds from the U-row, yet use the small vowels. Again, you see small vowels used in katakana far more often than you do in hiragana to represent sounds that the Japanese language doesn't traditionally have.

The most important thing right now is to be able to read these extra combinations and know they exist. You'll see some of these pretty often, which means that through experience they will get natural. It's just one of those things you have to use and experience to become comfortable with it. I think the main problem is that they're foreign… but not completely foreign. They're based off foreign languages, probably a language that you know, which means that these sounds (and the rest of katakana) are asking you to break your own language and speak it incorrectly so that you can speak it "correctly" in Japanese. It's a weird conundrum.

Long vowels (nobashibo - )

Unlike hiragana, which deals with long vowels by adding more vowels to things, katakana has a special vowel extender character. Luckily it's very simple: a dash. ー When you see this, you'll just need to extend the vowel that it comes after. For example: チズ = chizu チーズ = chiizu

ベコン = bekon ベーコン = beekon The vowels are doubled for the sake of example, but really, what it sounds like is just a long smooth extended sound, rather than repeated vowels — like "cheese" and "bacon." In fact, チーズ and ベーコン are how you write "cheese" and "bacon" in katakana.

Now, take a guess and read: ベーコンチーズバーガー. …That's "beekon chiizu baagaa (bacon cheese burger)." You can now read "bacon cheese burger" on menu written in Japanese! 🍔

At this point, you can probably imagine that you'll see this dash quite a lot in katakana. Knowing how and when to use it, especially when you try to "spell" out words you don't really know the spelling of, can be challenging. With a lot of experience, mistakes, and even more experience you'll start to understand when and how to use it. For now, just focus on reading it correctly. That part is much easier, and that is the part that will give you the experience you need to reproduce it later on.

Unlike Hiragana, where long vowel sounds are indicated using another vowel character, Katakana writing makes use of the nobashibō (-). The word “nobashibō” literally means “stretching verbs”

Other small pronunciation notes

For the most part, everything will be pronounced exactly the same. When there is an exception to the rule I'll let you know.

フ is special because it’s the only syllable in Japanese to have a sound very close to an “F” sound. Therefore, you can combine フ with smaller versions of kanakana vowels to make a whole F-Column like this: ファ (fa), フィ (fi), フ (fu), フェ (fe), フォ (fo)

ツ (tsu) | ヅ (du) ヴ vu

Japanese sound system

The Japanese sounds system consists of a total of 23 consonant sounds and 5 vowel sounds (Compared to English with 24? consonant sounds and 14 vowel sounds). When spoken, the Japanese language is formed using either vowels or a consonant-vowel pair with the exception of the "n" sound which is the sole single consonant sound used. Additional sounds, such as double consonants and glides, are formed by glottal stops or combining the “i” sound with the “y” sound. Furthermore, Japanese is a language with pitch accent. These pitches, high and low, are used to distinguish similarly spelled words with different pronunciations. These pitches follow certain rules, such as the first and second mora (syllable) must have different pitches, and that once a word has moved to the low pitch it will not return to the high pitch. Though this may sound complicated to a speaker unfamiliar with pitch-accent languages, the basics are relatively simple to learn and often context makes it obvious what the word is.

Japanese writing system

The Japanese writing system was introduced around 1500 years ago from China, in the late fourth or early fifth century. Through time, the Japanese language has evolved into its own system. Currently, Japanese has three types of writing: hiragana, katakana, and kanji. Kanji, which were imported from China, were traditionally used for both their meaning and their sound. Hiragana is a collection of 46 characters with two diacritical marks that are used to denote the sounds of the Japanese language, and are in particular used for function words and inflectional ending, as well as in some content words. Each hiragana symbolizes with a vowel or a consonant combined with a vowel. The characters evolved as simplifications of traditional Chinese characters with similar sounds during the Heian period (794 -1185) in Japan. Due to the use of hiragana in many women’s literary works, such as “Tale of Genji” by Murasaki Shikibu, hiragana was known as onna de, or women’s hand. Katakana, which is also a syllabary, is used for loan words, onomatopoeic words and scientific words. Frequent contact has resulted in many words being borrowed from English, though words have also been borrowed from other languages such as German.