This guide is a part of my ULTIMATE Pronunciation guide. If you haven’t seen the first part yet, make sure to check out from the beginning here.

My first temptation when writing this guide was to provide examples of these sounds in terms of how they might sound in English words, but this would be misguided given that there are countries all over the world that pronounce English differently. Therefore, I have provided letters in the form of the International Phonetic Alphabet along with audio clips to demonstrate the sounds.

Now that you have a solid grasp on what a mora is, it’s time to apply that knowledge as we learn the first 5 (and most important) sounds that make up the Japanese language. Let’s dive right in, shall we?

Hiragana Romaji IPA(what’s this?)

あ a a

い i i

う u u͍

え e e

お o o

If the Japanese letters are the bricks that build the Japanese language, then these five sounds are the clay that make the bricks! These five sounds are in 98% of the entire Japanese alphabet. This is one of the main reasons that people find learning Japanese sounds relatively easy. This is also why people tend to learn new sounds and hiragana in series of five. Each new set of sounds you learn from here on out will contain these sounds plus one or two new “consonant” components.

One habit you may have to break when remembering these letters is how you put them in order. In English, vowel sounds are ordered “A E I O U”. The first five sounds of Japanese, however, are ordered “A I U E O”. It is very important that you keep these two separate as not only are they ordered differently, but they are also pronounced differently.

It really is that simple, and if I weren’t making the ULTIMATE guide to pronunciation I could end it here and be confident that you know enough about these letters to move on to the next set of 5 once you can pronounce these sounds. However, this guide is indeed “ultimate” and my conscience won’t let me be a liar, so I will go through a plethora of examples and define as many nuances as I can find. Lucky you!

Examples, Nuances, and Such

I will break down each letter with examples that encompass as many uses of the letter as I can think of. This is a good opportunity to listen to each word and try to hear the sound as it’s being used – keeping in mind what you learned about morae in the previous article (you did read it, didn’t you?). Also, don’t feel that you need to memorize any of the meanings of the words as this guide focuses strictly on pronunciation and not vocabulary building.

あ – A

Some words that contain あ are:

Hiragana Romaji Meaning

あか aka red

あり ari ant

あし ashi foot/leg

あい ai love

あたま atama head

あたらしい atarashii new

おかあさん okaasan mother

ばあい baai case/situation



あ can also be used to indicate surprise. I wouldn’t really classify this as a “word” as it’s akin to the English “huh?” or “hnh?”, but it’s worth a mention.

あっ！何それ！？

a! nanisore!?

Huh? What’s that!?

い – I

Some words that contain い are:

Hiragana Romaji Meaning

い i stomach

いい ii good

いく iku go

いぬ inu dog

まいにち mainichi everyday

くらい kurai dark

いっぱい ippai full

あたらしい atarashii new

You will commonly find this letter at the end of adjectives – in fact this is so common that there are grammar rules associated with “い adjectives”. You can read more about い adjectives on Tae Kim’s grammar guide – an excellent resource for all things related to Japanese grammar.

う- U

Some words that contain うare:

Hiragana Romaji Meaning

うま uma horse

うみ umi ocean

うしろ ushiro behind

うちゅう uchuu space

とうきょう toukyou Tokyo (city)

こうつう koutsuu traffic

あう au meet

Other Uses For “う”

う can also be used to sound out a groan:

うー、 お腹いったい.

Uuu 、onaka ittai

Ugh, My stomach hurts.

え – E

Some words that contain え are:

Hiragana Romaji Meaning

えだまめ edamame soybean

えらい erai admirable

こうえん kouen park

はえる haeru to grow/spring up/emerge(teeth)

こえ koe voice

まえ mae front/before (location)/before (time)

こたえ kotae answer



What You Should Know About “Ye”

You may know that English the word for the Japanese currency is “Yen”. There is actually no letter in the current Japanese alphabet that makes a “ye” sound. The real way to spell Yen is “えん (en)”, so in many of the cases that you see “ye”, it is very likely pronounced え instead.

This is because hundreds of years ago “え” used to have a very similar pronunciation to “ye”, and so the characters were romanized this way and for some reason have stayed romanized this way. However, this is no longer the case.

Other Uses For え

The え sound can also be used to sound surprise, much like あ. It can also be used to sound out disbelief.

Surprise:

えっ！何それ！？

e! nanisore!?

Huh? What’s that!?

Disbelief:

えー！？ まじで？

ee!? Maji de?

Huh!? Seriously?

お – O

Some words that contain お are:

Hiragana Romaji Meaning

おいしい oishii delicious

おうさま ousama king

おとうさん otousan father

おおい ooi many

こおり koori ice

しお shio salt

かお kao face

This is one of the most straightforward of the five letters that you have learned. The sound is likely something you are used to pronouncing, and the romaji associated with it is very similar to it’s English counterpart. You will commonly find it at the beginning of a noun making it more polite, this is called an honorific prefix.

Other Uses For お

お can be used to indicate pleasant surprise:

おー！ すごい！

Oo! Sugoi!

Wow! Amazing!

I hope you found this guide useful. If you did (or even if you didn’t) let me know in the comments below! I’d love to hear your input!

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