kana chart (kanachart.com) - with hiragana, katakana, and kanji japanese symbols or characters

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hiragana

kc's tips

sa-(sah)

shi-(shee)see note 1

su-(soo)

se-(seh)

so-(soh)

kanachart.com is a free and easy online kana reference for those learning japanese.

hiragana and katakana alphabets are arranged by their starting letter; just click on the letter you want.

the numbered notes below the chart add little explanations for special characters that are different to normal ones.

new get the whole hiragana alphabet in a printable one page document

we recommend this kana book from amazon beginner's kana workbook : practice...

there's language options on these amazon jap-animation dvds

za-(zah)

ji-(jee)see note 2

zu-(zoo)

ze-(zeh)

zo-(zoh)

sha-(shah)

shu-(shoo)

sho-(shoh)

ja-(jah)

ju-(joo)

jo-(joh)

note 1: the character 'shi' is an exception to the s characters in that it contains an h. as shown in the pronunciation brackets it is pronounced differently too.

note 2: the character 'ji' is an exception to the z characters in that it starts with a j. as shown in the pronunciation brackets it is pronounced differently too.

kc says: when combined with a little (lower-case) character you compress the sounds of the two characters, making new (more rarely used) characters; pronounced as shown. only the characters shown here can be compressed in this way.

examples

- sushi (means 'japanese raw fish and rice') su-mi-ma-se-n

- sumimasen (means 'excuse me')