Hiragana Chart for Beginners: All 46, and How to Read It

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Every Japanese course starts in the same place: あ. Hiragana is the first of the three Japanese scripts a learner meets, and in modern Japanese it has 46 basic characters. That sounds like a lot of shapes to memorise one by one. It is far less work if you learn them as a chart.

This post lays out that chart, explains how to read it, adds the two small marks and the small letters that turn 46 characters into every sound in the language, and suggests an order to learn them in.

The chart: five vowels, ten rows

The chart is called the gojūon (五十音), “the fifty sounds”. Japanese has five vowels, and the chart always lists them in the same order: a, i, u, e, o. Every other basic character is a consonant followed by one of those vowels. Put the vowels across the top and the consonants down the side, and the whole script fits in one grid:

The romaji under each character uses the Hepburn system, the one most textbooks and signs use.

How to read the chart

Across a row, the consonant stays and the vowel changes. The k row is ka, ki, ku, ke, ko. Down a column, the vowel stays and the consonant changes. The a column is a, ka, sa, ta, na, ha, ma, ya, ra, wa. Learn that order of rows once and you have the order of Japanese word dictionaries, which are sorted by this chart rather than by an alphabet.

The vowels are short and clean, close to the vowels of Italian or Spanish: a as in “father”, i as in “machine”, u as in “food” but with relaxed lips, e as in “get”, o as in “more”.

A few cells do not follow the pattern on paper, and these are worth knowing from the start:

し is shi, ち is chi, つ is tsu and ふ is fu. In Japanese they still belong to their rows; the romaji simply spells the sound the way an English speaker would hear it.

を sits in the w row but is said o, just like お. Today it is used almost only as a grammar particle, the one that marks the object of a verb.

ん is the only character with no vowel at all. It sits outside the grid, at the very end.

Two more characters change their sound when they work as particles: は is read wa and へ is read e. That is why こんにちは, “hello”, is said konnichiwa.

Count the cells and the “fifty sounds” come to 45. The grid has fifty slots, but three never had a hiragana of their own (there is no yi, ye or wu), and two old characters for wi and we, ゐ and ゑ, were dropped by the spelling reform after the Second World War. You will see them now only in a few names. Add ん at the end and you reach 46.

Two small marks: dakuten and handakuten

Japanese has more sounds than the 46 characters show. Instead of new letters, it adds a mark to letters you already know.

The dakuten (゛), two short strokes at the top right, makes the consonant voiced: k becomes g, s becomes z, t becomes d, and h becomes b. The handakuten (゜), a small circle, goes on the h row only and turns it into p.

Notice that ぢ and づ sound the same as じ and ず. In most words you will write じ and ず, as in みず (mizu, water); the other two are used in a smaller set of words, mostly where ち or つ picks up a dakuten.

So ごはん (gohan, cooked rice) is just こ with a dakuten, then は and ん. でんわ (denwa, telephone) and りんご (ringo, apple) work the same way. You are not learning 25 new characters here, only two marks.

Small letters

Some characters also come in a smaller size, and the size changes how you read them.

Small ゃ ゅ ょ

Write a small ゃ, ゅ or ょ after a character from the i column, and the two merge into one syllable: き + ゃ is きゃ, kya. The i disappears.

The size matters. しゃしん (shashin, photo) has a small ゃ. Write it full size, しやしん, and you have three syllables, shi-ya-shin, which is not a word. おちゃ (ocha, tea) works the same way.

Small っ

A small っ is not said at all. It is a short pause that doubles the consonant after it, the way the two t’s in Italian gatto are held for a beat. きっぷ (kippu, ticket) is ki, a pause, then pu; romaji shows the pause by doubling the next letter. Without it you get きぷ, two quick syllables, and that is not the word.

One last thing to listen for is length. おばあさん (obaasan, grandmother) and おばさん (obasan, aunt) differ only by the extra あ that stretches the vowel. A long o is usually written with う, as in ありがとう (arigatou, thanks) and がっこう (gakkou, school). Many textbooks write those long vowels with a line instead, arigatō; the sound is the same.

A sensible order to learn them

Start with the five vowels. They are the column headings for everything else, and once you can say them cleanly every other row is a consonant in front of them.

Then go row by row, in chart order. Five characters at a time is a comfortable step. Say the row aloud, write it, read it back.

Read real words as early as you can. The first five rows alone already spell ねこ (neko, cat), いぬ (inu, dog), えき (eki, station), あさ (asa, morning), くつ (kutsu, shoes) and すし (sushi). A word sticks better than a letter on its own.

Write them by hand, in the right stroke order. Many are only one stroke, like し, つ and の; ふ has four. Writing is slower than reading, which is exactly why it helps you remember.

Keep look-alikes apart. Some pairs are easy to mix up at first: ぬ and め, ね and れ, る and ろ, さ and ち. Look at them side by side once, on purpose, and note what tells them apart.

Add the marks and small letters last. Dakuten, handakuten, ゃ ゅ ょ and っ are changes to characters you already know, so they take an afternoon, not a week. After that, katakana follows the same chart with different shapes.

Where Michi comes in

Michi (道, “the path”) teaches hiragana in this order. Its first unit, The sounds of Japanese & hiragana あ–の, covers the first 25 characters, the vowel row through the n row, five at a time. The second, Hiragana は–ん, dakuten & combos, finishes the chart and adds the marks, the small letters and long vowels. The example words in this post all come from those two units.

Each unit trains the characters four ways. You hear a sound and pick the kana, type the word you hear, trace characters over a faded model while Michi checks the number, position and direction of your strokes, and read a short passage made of the unit’s words. One listening question plays しゃしん and asks you to choose between しやしん, しゃしん and さしん. The audio is text-to-speech, new kana are played slowly, and the listening exercises have a slower setting.

Both hiragana units are part of the free Starter stage, together with katakana, greetings, numbers and survival phrases, on iPhone, iPad and Android. Michi Premium opens the path from N5 to N1.