Japanese Verb Conjugation: Five Steps, One Step, One Chart

Japanese verb conjugation is smaller than the search results make it look — Japanese verbs come in three groups. Two of them follow rules, and the third has exactly two members — する (suru), to do, and 来るくる (kuru), to come. There are two tenses, and no future to build. One verb has eight basic forms, and then it stops.

The names already tell you how it works: a 五段ごだん (godan) verb is a five-step verb, and its ending walks all five steps. A 一段いちだん (ichidan) verb is a one-step verb, and it never leaves the step it starts on. Those steps are the あ (a), い (i), う (u), え (e), お (o) you met on your first day of hiragana.

So a Japanese verb conjugation chart isn't a new thing to memorize; it's the kana grid you already own, read in a different direction. The verb takes the last seat in a Japanese sentence — that's the one fixed rule in our field note on sentence structure. This note is about what the verb does once it's sitting there.

Take one verb and count. 飲むのむ (nomu) means drink, and it belongs to the largest of the three groups. Two tenses, two levels of politeness, positive and negative: two times two times two. Eight forms. That's the basic set for this verb, and for nearly every other verb too.

Each group carries two or three names, which is most of the reason the topic looks crowded. U-verbs are also called godan verbs, or Group 1, and ru-verbs are ichidan verbs, or Group 2. The irregulars are Group 3, and the whole of Group 3 is する (suru) and 来るくる (kuru) — learn those two as words and the irregular verbs are finished.

Say someone offers you a refill and you've already had one, and a single form answers the whole question:

もう飲みましたもうのみました (mounomimashita)

(I) already drank it.

Here are all eight, plain on one side and polite on the other, and as you read down the meanings, watch what stays still: the front of the verb never moves.

The name is the explanation. 段だん (dan) is a step of a staircase, and it's also the word for a row of the kana chart. A godan verb is a five-step verb, and its ending moves up and down five of them.

Take 聞くきく (kiku), to listen or to ask: the ending is く (ku), which sits on the う (u) step. Slide it down to か (ka) and the negative appears. Slide it to き (ki) and you have the polite form. The dictionary form stays where it started, and two more steps sit above it.

An ichidan verb does none of this, and 食べるたべる (taberu) keeps べ (be) in place for every form — 食べないたべない (tabenai), 食べますたべます (tabemasu), 食べるたべる (taberu). One step, and the verb never steps off it. The name says so.

That staircase is the あ (a), い (i), う (u), え (e), お (o) grid from the hiragana field note. You learned it as an alphabet. It turns out to be the engine.

Lost near a station, you stop someone and ask the way, and afterwards you can report the whole thing in one sentence:

駅で道を聞きましたえきでみちをききました (ekidemichiwokikimashita)

(I) asked the way at the station.

Here is 聞くきく (kiku) on all five steps, in the order of the chart.

Here's the one place where the ending lies to you. Plenty of u-verbs end in る (ru) as well, so the る (ru) on its own sorts nothing. It is where wrong forms come from most often in the first year.

There is a decent test, and it looks at the sound just before the る (ru). If that sound sits on the あ (a), う (u) or お (o) row, the verb is a u-verb, every time. If it sits on い (i) or え (e), the verb is usually a ru-verb. Usually, not always.

帰るかえる (kaeru) is the famous counterexample. It means to go home, it ends in る (ru), and the sound in front is え (e) — so the test says ru-verb, and the test is wrong. 帰るかえる (kaeru) is a u-verb, which is why the polite form is 帰りますかえります (kaerimasu) and not かえます (kaemasu).

So treat the ending as a hint, never a rule: check the group, and don't guess from the る (ru).

The verb turns up the moment you talk about your evening:

六時に帰りますろくじにかえります (rokujinikaerimasu)

(I) go home at six.

Three verbs get you most of the way through the trap: 帰るかえる (kaeru), 入るはいる (hairu), 走るはしる (hashiru). All three end in る (ru). All three are u-verbs.

The masu form is the polite ending, and it's the first one most courses hand you. Attach ます (masu) and you have the polite non-past, and three more forms then fall out of the same stem, with nothing new to learn.

ません (masen) is the polite negative. ました (mashita) is the polite past. ませんでした (masendeshita) is the polite past negative. The stem holds still through all four — 飲みのみ (nomi) stays 飲みのみ (nomi), and you only swap the tail.

Plain forms sit beside them in the chart above, and they aren't ruder — they're a different setting, chosen by who you're speaking to and where you are. That choice is a subject of its own, and the field note on politeness levels takes it apart properly.

Telling a colleague what your day looks like takes one verb and one ending:

今日は働きませんきょうははたらきません (kyouhahatarakimasen)

(I) am not working today.

Four endings, one stem. That's the polite half of the eight already done.

Japanese verb tenses come to two, and that's the whole list: non-past and past. English speakers go looking for a future form and don't find one. There isn't one to find.

The non-past covers now and later at the same time. 飲みますのみます (nomimasu) is drink and will drink at once, and a time word decides which — today, tomorrow, every morning. The verb doesn't stretch to reach the future. The sentence around it does that work.

Say where you're going tomorrow and the verb stays exactly where it was:

明日東京へ行きますあしたとうきょうへいきます (ashitatoukyouheikimasu)

(I) will go to Tokyo tomorrow.

Japanese past tense is the only other one you build, and it takes two shapes: plain 飲んだのんだ (nonda) and polite 飲みましたのみました (nomimashita). Put the two tenses against politeness and polarity and you get the eight forms from the top of this page. There is no ninth waiting behind them.

The Japanese te form isn't a tense at all. It's the connector. It links one clause to the next, it sits under polite requests, and it carries the ongoing forms you meet soon afterwards. Most of the longer patterns lean on it, which is why it arrives so early.

Building it is where the sound changes live, and there are five rules that sort by the last sound of the dictionary form. Ru-verbs skip the whole business: drop る (ru), add て (te), done.

Two errands in one sentence, connected at the て (te):

水を買って、帰りましたみずをかって、かえりました (mizuwokatte,kaerimashita)

(I) bought water and went home.

Here are the five, one row each, for u-verbs, with a verb you already know beside them.

One verb refuses to play. 行くいく (iku) ends in く (ku), so the table above predicts いいて (iite), and nobody has ever said that. The real form is 行っていって (itte), borrowed from the って (tte) row, and it's the exception everybody quotes — in this table it's the only one.

The slips that do happen are almost always a rule applied to the wrong row:

❌ かいて (kaite) — the く (ku) pattern, put on 買うかう (kau)

⭕ 買ってかって (katte) — う (u) takes the small っ ()

Five rows and one exception. That's the connector.

Verbs aren't the only words that change shape, and an い (i)-adjective conjugates itself, the way a verb does. 高いたかい (takai) is expensive; 高かったたかかった (takakatta) is the same word saying was expensive. Nothing is added to help it.

That catches nearly everyone once. Past tense feels like something you bolt on at the end, so でした (deshita) goes on and the adjective is left untouched:

❌ 高いでしたたかいでした (takaideshita)

⭕ 高かったですたかかったです (takakattadesu)

The です (desu) is only politeness. It never carries tense, so the adjective has to do it.

な (na)-adjectives work the other way around: they don't bend at all, they lean on the copula, so 静かだしずかだ (shizukada) becomes 静かだったしずかだった (shizukadatta). A few words ending in the い (i) sound belong to this group anyway — きれい (kirei), 有名ゆうめい (yuumei), 嫌いきらい (kirai).

Reporting back on a place you tried takes one adjective and no verb at all:

その店は高くなかったですそのみせはたかくなかったです (sonomisehatakakunakattadesu)

That shop wasn't expensive.

And here's the thing that makes conjugation look endless. Forms stack. 飲むのむ (nomu) becomes 飲みたいのみたい (nomitai), want to drink, and 飲みたいのみたい (nomitai) can go negative and past like anything else.

But look at what it turned into on the way — たい (tai) ends in い (i), and it bends like an い (i)-adjective: 飲みたくないのみたくない (nomitakunai), 飲みたくなかったのみたくなかった (nomitakunakatta). The plain negative does the same — 飲まないのまない (nomanai), 飲まなかったのまなかった (nomanakatta). Stack as far as you like and you land back on the adjective endings from the top of this section.

So the chart has an edge, and it isn't far out. Three groups, two of them regular. Two tenses, no future. Two irregular verbs, both of them words you'll use in your first week. And for any one verb, eight basic forms — the same eight you counted at the top.

Find the group first, then change the ending: a u-verb moves its ending along the kana rows, so 飲むのむ (nomu) gives 飲まないのまない (nomanai) and 飲みますのみます (nomimasu), and the past 飲んだのんだ (nonda) takes a sound change on top. A ru-verb drops る (ru) and adds the ending you want: 食べるたべる (taberu) gives 食べないたべない (tabenai), 食べますたべます (tabemasu). する (suru) and 来るくる (kuru) are irregular and get learned as words, and through all of it the front of the verb never moves — only the tail does.

The names describe it exactly: 五段ごだん (godan) means five steps and 一段いちだん (ichidan) means one step. A godan verb's ending walks all five rows of its kana column — 聞かないきかない (kikanai), 聞きますききます (kikimasu), 聞くきく (kiku), 聞けるきける (kikeru), 聞こうきこう (kikou). An ichidan verb keeps one sound and changes only what follows it: 食べないたべない (tabenai), 食べますたべます (tabemasu), 食べるたべる (taberu). Godan verbs are also called u-verbs or Group 1, and ichidan verbs are ru-verbs or Group 2.

Two: non-past and past. There's no separate future tense, so the non-past covers the present and whatever is still to come, and a time word tells you which one is meant. 飲みますのみます (nomimasu) is drink and will drink at the same time, and adding politeness and polarity to those two tenses gives one verb eight basic forms.

Look at the sound just before the る (ru). If it sits on the あ (a), う (u) or お (o) row of the kana chart, the verb is a u-verb, every time. If it sits on い (i) or え (e), it's usually a ru-verb — usually, and the exceptions are real ones you meet early: 帰るかえる (kaeru), 入るはいる (hairu), 走るはしる (hashiru). Treat the ending as a hint, never a rule.

Two: する (suru), to do, and 来るくる (kuru), to come. Both are common, so you meet them early and pick up their forms as words rather than working them out — します (shimasu), して (shite), 来ますきます (kimasu), 来てきて (kite). A few other verbs bend a single form each, and 行くいく (iku) is the one you'll notice, with 行っていって (itte) where the く (ku) pattern would predict something else. Past that, the two groups behave.

Everything above is a map, and a map is not the walk. Inside Ukiyoe Japanese the same map exists as a concept lesson, The shape of conjugation: three verb groups, two adjective types, two tenses, on one page with example sentences attached. It's there so that every conjugation table you meet later has somewhere to sit.

The step-by-step changes live in the drills, where you type the form yourself instead of recognizing it on a page. The Conjugation gym asks for the て (te) form, the ない (nai) form and the rest, one verb at a time, and it tells you which pattern you reached for when you miss. Three groups, two tenses, eight forms — and somewhere to practice all eight.