Side view image of woman's arm in kimono sleeve writing Japanese katakana with a brush on paper placed on wooden table

How Hard is it to Learn Japanese Anyway?

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As the only language on Earth that combines 3 writing systems at once, it’s no wonder Japanese gets a reputation for being a difficult language!

So how hard is it to learn Japanese anyway? 

Writing systems aside, the pronunciation is easy for most! Japanese has just half as many sounds as English. 

Compared to many languages, Japanese grammar isn’t as hard as you might think! The sentence structure is slightly different from English, but there’s no plurals, fewer tenses and only 2 irregular verbs… compared to 200 in English! 

It’s not all a walk in the park though. Native Japanese speakers themselves confess that their language is difficult, especially kanji and keigo (polite speech).

But remember, anything can be learned with motivation and practice!

Let’s take a look at some features of the language today and see how hard it really is to learn Japanese!

Table Of Contents
  1. What makes a language ‘hard’?
  2. Pronunciation
  3. The Japanese writing system 
  4. Grammar
  5. Culture and politeness
Illustration of a girl reading a book with a lightbulb above her head, accompanied by the text, "How hard is it to learn Japanese?
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