Hiragana Practice: Test 20 Kana and Pick One Row to Redo

Another look at the hiragana chart shows every kana, but not which ones you can read without it. A hiragana practice test of 25 questions does, and four groups of misses decide the row you redo first.

A kana you cannot read needs one short sentence:

この字は読めません。このじはよめません。 (konojihayomemasen.)

I can't read this character.

After you have studied every hiragana row, small kana included, use this test to see what you can read alone. An unstudied row belongs to the 7-day plan in the field note on learning hiragana, not to this test.

Each kana on this page shows its reading beside it while “Romaji” in “Reading aids” is on. Keep “Romaji” off for all 25 questions.

Answer each question aloud or on paper, in romaji, Japanese spelled in Latin letters. This test is about sounds, not spelling, so any romaji system works and “zi” for じ (ji) counts.

A long vowel, one vowel sound held twice as long, takes two letters or one letter with a mark over it. A small っ () takes the next consonant written twice.

A blank, a different sound, or an answer given after looking at the table is a miss. If the readings were showing while you answered, hide them and take those questions again. Speed does not matter in this hiragana quiz.

Number a sheet of paper from 1 to 25. The test has two parts. Questions 1 to 20 are 20 kana, some single and some in pairs:

1 ね (ne), 2 く (ku), 3 ぐ (gu), 4 しゃ (sha), 5 れ (re)

6 せ (se), 7 ず (zu), 8 ちょ (cho), 9 わ (wa), 10 つ (tsu)

11 ど (do), 12 にゅ (nyu), 13 る (ru), 14 ふ (fu), 15 び (bi)

16 りょ (ryo), 17 ほ (ho), 18 ゆ (yu), 19 ぽ (po), 20 め (me)

Questions 21 to 25 are five short words. Read each one as a whole word:

21 それ (sore), 22 かばん (kaban), 23 ちょっと (chotto), 24 いいえ (iie), 25 すし (sushi)

With all 25 answered, you can show the readings again. Mark each question you missed. In “Reading,” each word has a space between its kana sounds.

In “Group and row,” the letter is the group you count, and the rest names a row on the Kana page in Ukiyoe Japanese.

Group (a) is look-alike shapes, (b) is voicing marks, (c) is small kana and long vowels, and (d) is other plain kana. Voicing marks are the two dots or the small round mark that change a kana's sound.

Each question counts in its own group, whatever you read it as. In a word, the group comes from one part of it, such as れ (re) in それ (sore).

Use the first step that fits you. These steps are this page's own rule, not a JLPT or textbook standard.

If every answer was right, start at the a-row of the “Katakana” tab on the Kana page. If you read katakana too, try the field note with a kanji quiz next.

If all four groups have a miss, start again at the a-row of the “Hiragana” tab. The 7-day plan in the field note on learning hiragana starts there too.

Otherwise, count the misses in each group. The group with the most misses is yours, and a tie goes to the first of (d), (a), (b), (c).

That order follows the “Hiragana” tab: plain rows, then voicing marks, then small kana. Among plain rows, (d) goes first, because a kana you cannot read comes before two you confuse.

In your group, redo the row of your misses that comes first in the “Hiragana” tab. For group (a), also read the part on look-alikes in the field note on learning hiragana.

Suppose your misses are 5 れ (re), 7 ず (zu), 9 わ (wa), and 19 ぽ (po). That is two in (a) and two in (b), so (a) comes first. Its rows are the ra-row and the wa-row, and the ra-row comes first.

Choosing a row and tapping “Practice this row” gives four-choice questions on each kana, from kana to reading and from reading to kana. For three kana you type the reading in romaji, and for three you hear a sound and pick the kana.

A question you miss returns at the end under “One more try,” and the set does not end until you answer it right. Kana rows are not part of the daily practice limit, and a repeated row uses none of it.

The Kana page cannot see your answers here, so you open the row yourself. Its typed questions use Hepburn spellings, the ones shown in “Reading” for questions 1 to 20, so “si” for し (shi) is marked wrong there.

Each practice set uses one row. No set on the Kana page asks about kana from different rows, so it has no set of only your misses from several rows. Inside a row, the set asks about every kana, not only the ones you missed.

In the “Hiragana” tab, the 19 rows go from the a-row to “small っ () & long vowels.” That last row has no いい (ii), so for question 24 it practices the long-vowel rule with other kana, such as こう (kou). The kya-row and the nya-row are named after their first sounds and include ちょ (cho) and りょ (ryo), in that order.

A row is a small set of kana, and you can return to it whenever a test points to it again. After one row, take the same 25 questions again, or move to the group with the next most misses.

Whichever group has the most misses gives your row, the first of its missed rows in the “Hiragana” tab.

Between groups with equal misses, (d) comes first, then (a), then (b), then (c).

No misses means the “Katakana” tab, and misses in all four groups mean the a-row.

Not for this test, which asks only for readings. Writing kana by hand is a different skill from reading them, and you can practice it separately.

To read Japanese text, recognizing each kana is the skill to build first, and it is the one these 25 questions measure.

In this test, yes, because romaji is how you record the sounds you read. Reading Japanese text in romaji is a different matter.

For a kana you can already read, the field note on learning hiragana explains why to read it in kana, even slowly.

This page has no katakana version of the 25 questions. On the Kana page, the “Katakana” tab has 19 rows arranged like the hiragana ones. To begin reading katakana itself, start with the field note on learning katakana, which also covers its own look-alike characters.