The system of representing written
Japanese currently consists of 2,136 characters.
List of characters
* For brevity, only one English translation is given per
kanji
are logographic Chinese characters, adapted from Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script, used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are ...
.
* The "Grade" column specifies the grade in which the kanji is taught in
Elementary schools in Japan
In Japan, are compulsory to all children begin first grade in the April after they turn six—kindergarten is growing increasingly popular, but is not mandatory—and starting school is considered an important event in a child's life.
Histor ...
. Grade "S" means that it is taught in
secondary school
A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., b ...
.
* The list is sorted by Japanese reading (
on'yomi
, or the Sino-Japanese vocabulary, Sino-Japanese reading, is the reading of a kanji based on the historical Chinese pronunciation of the character. A single kanji might have multiple ''on'yomi'' pronunciations, reflecting the Chinese pronuncia ...
in
katakana
is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script (known as rōmaji).
The word ''katakana'' means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana characters are derived fr ...
, then
kun'yomi
is the way of reading kanji characters using the native Japanese word that matches the meaning of the Chinese character when it was introduced. This pronunciation is contrasted with ''on'yomi'', which is the reading based on the original Chi ...
in
hiragana
is a Japanese language, Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with ''katakana'' as well as ''kanji''.
It is a phonetic lettering system. The word ''hiragana'' means "common" or "plain" kana (originally also "easy", ...
), in accordance with the ordering in the official Jōyō table.
* This list does not include characters that were present in older versions of the list but have since been removed ().
* Hyphens in the kun'yomi readings separate kanji from their
okurigana
are kana suffixes following kanji stems in Japanese written words. They serve two purposes: to inflect adjectives and verbs, and to force a particular kanji to have a specific meaning and be read a certain way. For example, the plain verb f ...
.
*The "New" column attempts to reflect the official glyph shapes as closely as possible. This requires using the characters 𠮟, 塡, 剝, 頰 which are outside of Japan's basic character set,
JIS X 0208
JIS X 0208 is a 2-byte character set specified as a Japanese Industrial Standards, Japanese Industrial Standard, containing 6879 graphic characters suitable for writing text, place names, personal names, and so forth in the Japanese language. Th ...
(one of them is also outside the Unicode BMP). In practice, these characters are usually replaced by the characters 叱, 填, 剥, 頬, which are present in JIS X 0208.
* The "Old" column reflects the official
kyūjitai
''Kyūjitai'' () are the traditional forms of kanji (Chinese written characters used in Japanese writing). Their simplified counterparts are '' shinjitai'' (). Some of the simplified characters arose centuries ago and were in everyday use in bot ...
specified in the standard jōyō table; it does not include unofficial, extended, or
Asahi characters
Asahi (Japanese 朝日, 旭, or あさひ 'morning sun') may refer to:
Places in Japan Cities
* Asahi, Chiba (旭市; ''Asahi-shi'')
Wards
* Asahi-ku, Osaka (旭区; ''Asahi-ku'')
* Asahi-ku, Yokohama (旭; ''Asahi-ku'')
Towns
* Asahi, Aichi ...
.
* The readings presented here are those noted in the official Jōyō table. Special readings and uncommon readings are indicated in brackets.
[Se]
page 2, bullet point 7: "Readings indented one character to the right are special readings, or readings with very narrow use. Indented reading for which a prefecture name is indicated in the 'Remarks' column are, as a general rule, only ever used in the specified prefecture name." Other readings (generally less common, such as the
nanori) may also exist.
See also
*
Jōyō kanji
The are those kanji listed on the , officially announced by the Japanese Ministry of Education. The current List of jōyō kanji, list of 2,136 characters was issued in 2010. It is a slightly modified version of the tōyō kanji, kanji, which ...
*
List of kyōiku kanji
*
Table of Japanese kanji radicals
Notes
External links
Kanji Mnemonics by Henshall
{{DEFAULTSORT:Joyo Kanji
Lists of writing systems
Japanese writing system