How hard is Japanese, really?

Japanese is hard. Kungfucius sees no point in softening that: for an English speaker it is one of the most time-consuming languages there is, and the US Foreign Service Institute agrees. The difficulty sits mainly in reading, in the politeness system, and in something textbooks rarely mention, which is how hard it can be to find people to have real conversations with.

It has become easier than it used to be, thanks to a wave of good apps. Easier is not the same as easy. This page sets out what is hard, what is kinder than expected, how long it takes and where to begin.

What is hard about Japanese

The writing system. Japanese uses three scripts in the same sentence. Hiragana and katakana have 46 basic characters each and are learned in weeks. Kanji are the long project: the official list for everyday use, the jōyō kanji, has 2,136 characters.

Multiple readings. A Chinese character usually has one reading in Mandarin. In Japanese most have several. 生 alone is read differently in 生きる (ikiru, to live), 生まれる (umareru, to be born), 学生 (gakusei, student), 一生 (isshō, a lifetime) and 生ビール (nama bīru, draught beer). You do not learn kanji so much as learn words, one at a time. See the kanji guide.

Word order and particles. The verb comes last: 私は寿司を食べます (watashi wa sushi o tabemasu), "I sushi eat". Small particles mark each noun's role, and the difference between は (wa) and が (ga) is debated by learners at every level.

Politeness built into the verb. "To eat" is 食べる (taberu) among friends, 食べます (tabemasu) in polite speech, 召し上がります (meshiagarimasu) when a respected person eats, and いただきます (itadakimasu) when you humbly do. Honorific language, keigo, is something Japanese people themselves take courses in.

Counters. You count with different words for different kinds of objects, and the sounds shift: one, two, three long thin things are 一本 (ippon), 二本 (nihon), 三本 (sanbon).

What is left unsaid. Subjects are dropped, refusals are implied, and a sentence can end before its verb. Understanding Japanese means understanding context.

Three scripts, one verb at the end, and a politeness system that judges you silently.

What is easier than you might expect

• Pronunciation. Five clean vowels, simple syllables and no tones. Japanese does have pitch accent, explained below, but you will be understood without mastering it.
• Regular verbs. There are only two fully irregular verbs, する (suru, to do) and 来る (kuru, to come). The rest follow patterns.
• No gender, no articles, no plural endings. Verbs do not change for person.
• Kana are phonetic. Once you know hiragana and katakana, you can read aloud anything written in them.
• English loanwords. テレビ (terebi, television), コンピューター (konpyūtā, computer) and アイスクリーム (aisukurīmu, ice cream) are waiting for you in katakana.

Pitch accent: the catch in the easy pronunciation

Japanese has no tones in the Chinese sense, but every word has a pitch pattern. Each short beat, or mora, is either high or low, and what matters is where the pitch drops, if it drops at all. Standard Tokyo Japanese has one classic trio:

Word	Reading	Tokyo pattern	With the particle が (ga)
箸 (chopsticks)	háshi	High then low: the drop comes after the first beat	HA-shi-ga, low to the end
橋 (bridge)	hashí	Low then high, with the drop right after the word	ha-SHI-ga, the particle falls
端 (edge)	hashi	Low then high, with no drop	ha-SHI-GA, the particle stays high

Said alone, bridge and edge sound the same. The difference only appears on the particle that follows, which is why pitch accent is hard to hear at first. The acute marks above are a teaching aid, not part of standard romaji.

How much does it matter? Less than Chinese tones. Context almost always settles the meaning, and Japan's regions disagree among themselves: the Kansai pattern for many words is the reverse of Tokyo's. Wrong pitch is rarely misunderstood. It is simply the main thing that makes otherwise good Japanese sound foreign. Kungfucius's advice is to train your ear early, for a few hours, and not to let it delay your speaking.

Tools that help:

• OJAD, the Online Japanese Accent Dictionary from the University of Tokyo, is free, shows the pattern of words and verb forms, and can mark the pitch of a whole sentence you paste in.
• The NHK accent dictionary, NHK日本語発音アクセント新辞典 (NHK Nihongo Hatsuon Akusento Shinjiten), is the reference that Japanese broadcasters use.
• Shadowing: repeating along with native audio copies pitch together with rhythm, without your having to analyse either.

How long does it take to learn Japanese?

Source	Estimate	What it measures
US Foreign Service Institute (FSI)	Category IV, 88 weeks, about 2,200 class hours	Full-time classroom training of English-speaking diplomats to professional working proficiency, with homework on top
JLPT (the official Japanese test)	No official study hours	The organisers describe each level by what you can do, and since the 2010 revision they publish no lists of required kanji or vocabulary either
Language schools (unofficial)	For the top level, N1, published figures range from about 900 hours to more than 4,000	Rough commercial estimates that disagree widely; learners who already read Chinese characters need far less
Kungfucius's estimate (opinion, not data)	Travel Japanese in some months, comfortable conversation in a few years, comfortable reading of adult texts later still	Part-time learners with steady habits

The honest reading is that nobody can give you a precise number. The FSI figure is the only one here that rests on decades of teaching real students, and it describes full-time study towards a professional goal. The levels of the test are explained under JLPT, and the organisers answer common questions in the official JLPT FAQ.

Is Japanese harder than Chinese?

They are hard in different places. Japanese is easier to pronounce and has no tones. Chinese has simpler grammar and one reading per character. For reading, many learners find Japanese the heavier load, because of the multiple readings and the mix of scripts. The comparison is worked through at is Chinese easier than Japanese.

Why finding conversation practice is harder

This part is Kungfucius's experience, not a measurement, and individual experiences differ. Japanese society can be somewhat closed to newcomers. People are polite, helpful and often genuinely kind, but close friendships tend to form slowly, inside established circles: school, company, club. Japanese has words for the pattern, 内 (uchi, inside) and 外 (soto, outside), and for the gap between 本音 (honne, what one really thinks) and 建前 (tatemae, what one says in public).

For a learner this has a practical cost. Fewer close friendships mean fewer long, deep, unguarded conversations, and those are the conversations that teach the most. You can live in Japan for years on shop phrases and friendly small talk, be told 日本語がお上手ですね (Nihongo ga ojōzu desu ne, "your Japanese is so good") after a single word, and still rarely discuss anything that matters.

The way around it is to join the inside of something. In Kungfucius's experience these work:

• Clubs and circles. A サークル (sākuru) for hiking, music, board games or a sport gives you a group that meets every week and a reason to talk.
• Classes taught in Japanese. Cooking, calligraphy, martial arts, pottery. You are a fellow student first and a foreigner second.
• Shared hobbies. A regular bar, a running group, a climbing gym. Friendships in Japan often grow from showing up at the same place again and again.
• Language exchanges. Partners who want your language have a reason to give you time, in person or through apps.
• Local volunteer classes. Many towns have an international association, 国際交流協会 (kokusai kōryū kyōkai), where volunteers teach Japanese cheaply and are glad to talk.

Patience matters more than charm here. The door opens slowly and then stays open.

Japanese has become easier, but it is still very hard

Kungfucius's view is that Japanese is easier to learn now than it was a decade or two ago, mostly because of apps. Kanji used to mean paper cards and paper dictionaries. Now the memory work is scheduled for you and any word on a screen can be looked up with a tap. The mountain is the same height. The path is better marked.

Tools with a Kungfucius review:

• WaniKani: teaches kanji and vocabulary through radicals, mnemonics and spaced repetition over 60 levels, the first three free.
• Bunpro: spaced repetition for grammar points, organised by JLPT level.
• Anki: flexible flashcards for vocabulary and sentences, with many shared Japanese decks.
• Migaku: makes subtitles on anime, dramas and YouTube clickable and turns sentences into flashcards.
• LingQ: reading and listening to real texts with one-tap lookups and a count of known words.
• Pimsleur: half-hour audio lessons that make you speak aloud from day one, thin on reading.
• italki: one-to-one online lessons with tutors, paid per lesson, a direct answer to the conversation problem.
• HelloTalk: language exchange by text and voice with native speakers who correct you.
• Duolingo: short daily drills that are fine for kana and habit, not enough for grammar or kanji.

More options are on the best apps to learn Japanese page.

What to do first

1. Learn hiragana in week one and katakana in week two, and drop rōmaji as soon as you can read them.
2. Start one structured grammar course or textbook, and one kanji system, and keep both going daily.
3. Learn kanji inside words, never as isolated readings.
4. Book a weekly conversation from the first month, with a tutor or an exchange partner.
5. If you are in Japan, join one club or class this month. It will do more for your Japanese than a second textbook.