Reading
Notes on learning Japanese
How to learn, how to keep going, small bits of culture. Short reads that make the daily five minutes inside the app feel a little different.
- Guide2026-07-03· 7 min read
Common Beginner Mistakes and How to Fix Them
Typical stumbles for beginners: mixing up wa and ga, ni and de; conjugation slips; and confusing honorific and humble keigo. See each mistake with a clear fix.
- Exam prep2026-07-03· 6 min read
From N5 to N4: Bridging the Gap
What changes when you move from N5 to N4: the entry points to the potential form, tara conditionals, nagara, the passive, and the causative, plus tips for keeping up your study. N4 is the level just after N5.
- Guide2026-07-03· 6 min read
i-Adjectives and na-Adjectives: The Two Adjective Types
Learn how i-adjectives and na-adjectives differ, how they modify nouns, and how to form present, past, and negative endings, including the irregular ii to yokatta.
- Exam prep2026-07-03· 6 min read
JLPT N5 Grammar Essentials: The Building Blocks
A compact summary of core N5 grammar: the particles wa, ga, o, ni, de; desu and masu; the tai form; te kudasai; arimasu and imasu; and inviting with masen ka. N5 is the most basic of the five JLPT levels.
- Guide2026-07-03· 6 min read
Trains and Stations: Japanese for Getting Around
Practical phrases for buying tickets, using Suica or PASMO, passing ticket gates, transferring lines, and understanding delay announcements. Ask station staff for help with confidence.
- Guide2026-06-16· 6 min read
At the doctor: how to describe symptoms and feel less helpless when you're sick in Japan
Getting sick abroad is stressful, and explaining how you feel is the hard part. The core pattern is simple — "X hurts" plus a small symptom vocabulary. Here are the words and phrases to describe what's wrong at a clinic or pharmacy.
- Guide2026-06-16· 6 min read
Convenience store and shopping Japanese: the checkout call-and-response
The konbini is daily life in Japan, and its checkout runs on a fixed set of questions. Learn the four you'll hear every time, plus the one answer (大丈夫です) that confuses everyone, and you'll breeze through.
- Philosophy2026-06-16· 8 min read
Honne and tatemae: reading what is meant, not just what is said
Honne is the inner feeling; tatemae is the public face. Understanding this everyday distinction helps learners hear the soft no, the polite maybe, and the kindness behind indirect Japanese.
- Exam prep2026-06-16· 7 min read
Growing your Japanese listening: a friendly guide to choukai practice
Listening is the skill many learners avoid and then wish they had practiced. A patient, practical look at how to get familiar with the JLPT choukai section and natural spoken Japanese.
- Philosophy2026-06-16· 7 min read
Ma and the art of the pause: why silence is part of Japanese
In Japanese conversation, the pause is not empty space to fill but a meaningful part of the message. A gentle introduction to ma — the silence between words — and how learners can grow comfortable with it.
- Exam prep2026-06-16· 6 min read
Making N5 and N4 vocabulary actually stick: a memory-friendly approach
The first 1,500 words carry most of daily Japanese. A calm, repeatable way to practice N5 and N4 vocabulary using grouping, spacing, and real sentences instead of endless lists.
- Guide2026-06-16· 7 min read
Numbers and counters: why you can't just say "two" in Japanese
In Japanese you don't count things with bare numbers — you attach a counter word that changes with what you're counting. Here are the numbers, the counters you'll actually use, the sound changes, and a survival shortcut for when you forget.
- Guide2026-06-16· 7 min read
The world of Japanese onomatopoeia: doki-doki, fuwa-fuwa, and friends
Japanese overflows with sound and mood words like doki-doki and pera-pera. A beginner-friendly tour of giongo and gitaigo, why they matter, and how to start enjoying them.
- Culture2026-06-16· 7 min read
Onsen and sento: a relaxed first-timer's guide to Japanese baths
Public baths are one of Japan's great pleasures and a common source of first-timer nerves. A gentle, practical walkthrough of onsen and sento etiquette so you can relax instead of worrying.
- Guide2026-06-16· 6 min read
Restaurant Japanese: the six-beat script that gets you fed
Eating out in Japan follows a predictable sequence — being seated, ordering, eating, paying, leaving. Learn the phrase for each beat and you can walk into almost any restaurant with confidence.
- Culture2026-06-16· 12 min read
The Japanese year: seasonal greetings and festivals a visitor will meet
Japan marks the year with greetings, foods, and festivals tied closely to the seasons. A warm tour of the annual rhythm, from New Year to summer matsuri to autumn leaves, with phrases to enjoy along the way.
- Guide2026-06-16· 7 min read
The て-form: learn this one conjugation and a dozen grammar points open up
The て-form is the master key of Japanese verbs. Get the conjugation rules down and you unlock requests, the progressive, permission, linking actions, and more. Here are the rules, the mnemonic, and the traps.
- Guide2026-06-16· 7 min read
Time, dates, and days of the week: the high-frequency vocabulary worth memorizing early
Telling time and reading dates comes up every single day in Japan. The system is regular except for a handful of irregular readings that you simply have to memorize. Here they are, front and center.
- Guide2026-06-16· 7 min read
Japanese verb groups: identify the group, and conjugation stops being scary
Every Japanese verb belongs to one of three groups. Once you can tell which group a verb is in, every conjugation — polite, negative, te-form, past — follows the same predictable rule. Here's how to sort them.
- Guide2026-06-16· 7 min read
は vs が: the particle question every learner gets stuck on
Short version: は marks the topic (what we're already talking about), が marks the subject (often new or being singled out). Here's how to actually feel the difference instead of memorizing rules.
- Guide2026-05-28· 6 min read
Kanji starter pack: the 100 characters you actually need first
Forget the 2,136 character chart on the wall. These are the kanji that cover 60-70% of what you'll read in daily Japanese — and the smart order to learn them.
- Culture2026-05-28· 5 min read
How to ask for help in Japanese without sounding rude
Asking for help is one of the highest-stakes language moments — getting it wrong can sound demanding. Here are the phrases, registers, and small body moves that get you genuine help in Japan.
- Guide2026-05-27· 6 min read
Hiragana, Katakana, and the kanji that come after — the right order to learn them
Why hiragana first, katakana second, and how to think about kanji once you arrive at it. The script question that derails more beginners than grammar.
- Guide2026-05-27· 7 min read
Keigo without the panic — how Japanese politeness actually works
Sonkeigo, kenjogo, teineigo — three tiers that scare every learner and confuse most beginner textbooks. Here's the practical model that gets you through 90% of real situations.
- Culture2026-05-27· 7 min read
Your first day in Japan — the phrases and small moves you'll actually need
From the immigration officer to checking into your hotel, the convenience store, and the first restaurant — a walkthrough of the Japanese you'll actually use on your first 12 hours in the country.
- Culture2026-05-27· 5 min read
The many ways to say "I" in Japanese — and how to pick yours
Japanese has at least ten pronouns for "I", each carrying a different image of who you are. Why this matters more than grammar, and how to pick yours.
- Guide2026-05-26· 5 min read
Five-minute Japanese: the daily habit that actually works
How to spend five honest minutes a day on Japanese — and why that beats the weekend cramming you keep promising yourself.
- Exam prep2026-05-26· 6 min read
The honest JLPT roadmap — N5 to N3 without burning out
What the JLPT levels really mean for your day-to-day life in Japan, and how to plan the path from N5 to N3 without losing your weekends.
- Culture2026-05-26· 4 min read
Etiquette essentials: five small things Japanese learners get wrong
Five common etiquette mistakes that even fluent learners make in Japan — and what to do instead. None of these are deal-breakers, but getting them right makes everything smoother.
- Philosophy2026-05-26· 4 min read
A language quietly changes you — slowly, surely, for the better
Why we made Learning JP, and what we believe about picking up Japanese — for travel, for work, for the conversations you haven't had yet.
- Philosophy2026-01-01· 9 min read
Ikigai: what the word really means (and what it doesn't)
Ikigai is often drawn as a four-circle diagram online, but in everyday Japanese it points to something quieter: a reason to get up in the morning. Here is the word as learners actually meet it.
- Exam prep2026-01-01· 7 min read
How to read JLPT dokkai passages without running out of time
The JLPT reading section (dokkai) is as much a time-management test as a Japanese test. A few habits — reading the question first, scanning for the answer's location — make the clock far less scary.
- Exam prep2026-01-01· 10 min read
Learn kanji by radicals and SRS, not by brute force
Kanji stop looking random once you see the building blocks inside them. Pairing those radicals with spaced repetition turns thousands of characters into a smaller set of recombined parts to play with.
- Philosophy2026-01-01· 6 min read
Mottainai: the one word behind why Japan hates waste
Mottainai is the small exclamation Japanese speakers let out when something useful is about to be wasted. It is half regret, half respect for the thing itself. Here is how to feel it and use it.
- Culture2026-01-01· 6 min read
San, kun, chan, sama: how to address people in Japanese
Picking the wrong name suffix can sound too stiff or too familiar, so most learners are safest defaulting to san. Here is what each suffix signals and how people generally choose between them.