The course
Everything, in order
43 lessons, about 5 hours of reading. Work through them top to bottom, because each one assumes the ones above it. Tick lessons off as you go; your progress is saved in this browser.
Your progress43 lessons
Every sound Japanese has, plus both kana alphabets. Start here even if you already know a few words. Sounds come first.
- How Japanese sounds workJapanese has far fewer sounds than English or Hindi. We will cover the whole system in one lesson.6m
- Hiragana: vowels, か and さ rowsThe first fifteen characters: あいうえお, かきくけこ, さしすせそ.8m
- Hiragana: た, な and は rowsFifteen more characters, including the two Japanese sounds that trip everyone up: つ and ふ.8m
- Hiragana: ま, や, ら, わ and んThe last sixteen characters, and the Japanese R, which is not an R at all.8m
- Voicing: dakuten and handakutenTwo small marks turn か into が and は into ぱ. Twenty-five new sounds, no new shapes.5m
- Combined sounds (ようおん)A small ゃ, ゅ or ょ merges into the previous character to make one beat.5m
- Length: long vowels and っIn Japanese, holding a sound longer gives you a different word, so length is worth getting right early.6m
- Katakana: the second alphabetSame 46 sounds, sharper shapes. Katakana is used for foreign words, which means many of them are words you already know.9m
- Reading practicePut the whole script together on real words and your first full sentences.7m
Counting, telling time, dates, money and age, plus the counter system, which is the part nobody warns you about.
- Numbers 1 to 10Ten readings, three of which have two forms. Learn which form to prefer and why.5m
- Numbers beyond tenBuilding 11 to 99,999 by stacking, plus the sound changes that break the pattern.7m
- Counters: the part nobody warns you aboutYou cannot just say "three" in Japanese. The word changes with what you are counting.9m
- Telling timeHours and minutes, including the four readings that refuse to follow the rules.6m
- Dates, months and days of the weekThe first ten days of the month are irregular. The weekdays are named after the sun, the moon and five elements.7m
- Numbers in the wildMoney, age, phone numbers and addresses, where digits and kana mix on the page.6m
The grammar that gets you speaking: sentence structure, particles, adjectives and verbs. If you read Hindi, this module will feel unexpectedly familiar.
- The shape of a Japanese sentenceVerb last, markers after words, and anything obvious simply left out.7m
- です and saying what things areThe X は Y です frame: your first complete sentence.6m
- は and が: the hard one, earlyTwo particles that both look like "the subject". The difference is topic versus new information.8m
- The particles you need dailyを, に, で, へ, と, も, から, まで: what each one marks.9m
- これ, それ, あれ: this and thatJapanese splits "that" into two: near you, and near neither of us.5m
- Adjectives: い and なTwo types, and only one of them conjugates.7m
- Verbs and the ます formThree verb groups, one polite ending, and no agreement to worry about.8m
- Past tense and negativesFour endings that cover every polite verb form you need at N5.5m
- The て formOne form, many uses: requests, joining sentences, and actions in progress.8m
- ある and いる: existenceTwo verbs for "there is", split by whether the thing is alive.5m
- Question wordsWhat, who, where, when, why and how, plus the counting question 何.5m
How kanji work, and the roughly hundred characters JLPT N5 expects. Learn the system before the list.
- How kanji workWhy one character has several readings, and how to stop finding that alarming.7m
- Kanji: numbers and timeThe first characters to learn, because you already know what they mean.6m
- Kanji: people, places and natureThe pictographic characters: the ones that still look like what they mean.7m
- Kanji: everyday verbs and adjectivesThe action characters that carry most N5 sentences.6m
Plain form, casual speech, and the grammar that turns careful textbook sentences into the way people talk.
- Plain form: everyday JapaneseThe ます form is polite. Plain form is the default everywhere else, and N4 is built on it.8m
- The た form and casual speechThe plain past, built exactly like the て form, plus how casual sentences drop their edges.7m
- Quoting, thinking, and describing nounsと思う, と言う, and relative clauses: the three things that let you build long sentences.8m
- Potential form: being able toOne conjugation that replaces "can", and changes which particle you use.6m
- Volitional: let’s, and intending toThe よう form: making suggestions, and stating what you plan to do.5m
- Conditionals: と, ば, たら, ならFour ways to say "if", and which one to reach for.9m
- Giving and receivingあげる, くれる and もらう: three verbs where English has two, and the difference is who benefits.7m
- Passive formBeing done to, including the uniquely Japanese "suffering passive".7m
- Causative formMaking and letting someone do something, and the polite request built from it.6m
- Transitive and intransitive pairsJapanese has two verbs where English has one: opening a door, and a door opening.7m
- Endings that do a lot of work〜ながら, 〜すぎる, 〜やすい, 〜にくい, 〜そう: small additions with big range.6m
- Keigo: a first look at polite speechThe honorific and humble forms you will hear every day in shops, offices and stations.7m
- N4 kanji: the next 200How the second batch differs from the first, and the highest-value characters in it.7m