We've now learned how to describe nouns in various ways with other nouns and adjectives. This gives us quite a bit of expressive power. However, we still cannot express actions. This is where verbs come in. Verbs, in Japanese, always come at the end of clauses. Since we have not yet learned how to create more than one clause, for now it means that any sentence with a verb must end with the verb. We will now learn the three main categories of verbs, which will allow us to define conjugation rules. Before learning about verbs, there is one important thing to keep in mind.
Or to rephrase, unlike English, the only thing you need to make a grammatically complete sentence is a verb and nothing else! That's why even the simplest, most basic Japanese sentence cannot be translated into English!
A grammatically complete sentence:
Before we can learn any verb conjugations, we first need to learn how verbs are categorized. With the exception of only two exception verbs, all verbs fall into the category of ru-verb or u-verb.
All ru-verbs end in 「る」 while u-verbs can end in a number of u-vowel sounds including 「る」. Therefore, if a verb does not end in 「る」, it will always be an u-verb. For verbs ending in 「る」, if the vowel sound preceding the 「る」 is an /a/, /u/ or /o/ vowel sound, it will always be an u-verb. Otherwise, if the preceding sound is an /i/ or /e/ vowel sound, it will be a ru-verb in most cases. A list of common exceptions are at the end of this section.
If you're unsure which category a verb falls in, you can verify which kind it is with most dictionaries. There are only two exception verbs that are neither ru-verbs nor u-verbs as shown in the table below.
| ru-verb | u-verb | exception |
|---|---|---|
| 見る | 話す | する |
| 食べる | 聞く | 来る |
| 寝る | 泳ぐ | |
| 起きる | 遊ぶ | |
| 考える | 待つ | |
| 教える | 飲む | |
| 出る | 買う | |
| いる | ある | |
| 着る | 死ぬ |
Here are some example sentences using ru-verbs, u-verbs, and exception verbs.
Below is a list of u-verbs with a preceding vowel sound of /i/ or /e/ ("iru" or "eru" sound endings). The list is not comprehensive but it does include many of the more common verbs categorized roughly into three levels.
| Basic | Intermediate | Advanced |
|---|---|---|
| 要る | 焦る | 嘲る |
| 帰る | 限る | 覆る |
| 切る | 蹴る | 遮る |
| しゃべる | 滑る | 罵る |
| 知る | 握る | 捻る |
| 入る | 練る | 翻る |
| 走る | 参る | 滅入る |
| 減る | 交じる | 蘇る |
Here is a list of a few verbs and the accompanying kanji that you will find useful.
There's really not much to do at this point except to practice classifying verbs as either a ru-verb or an u-verb. You can also take this opportunity to learn some useful verbs if you do not know them already. We'll learn how to conjugate these verbs according to their category in the next few sections.
In the chart below, you should mark whether the given verb is either an u-verb or a ru-verb. The first answer is given as an example of what you need to do. Obviously, verbs that do not end in 「る」 are always going to be u-verbs so the tricky part is figuring out the category for verbs that end in 「る」. Remember that verbs that do not end in "eru" or "iru" will always be u-verbs. While most verbs that do end in "eru" or "iru" are ru-verbs, to make things interesting, I've also included a number of u-verbs that also end in eru/iru. Though you do not need to memorize every word in the list by any means, you should at least memorize the basic verbs.
| verb | ru-verb | u-verb | exception verb |
| 行く | ● | ||
| 出る | ● | ||
| する | ● | ||
| 買う | ● | ||
| 売る | ● | ||
| 食べる | ● | ||
| 入る | ● | ||
| 来る | ● | ||
| 飲む | ● | ||
| しゃべる | ● | ||
| 見る | ● | ||
| 切る | ● | ||
| 帰る | ● | ||
| 書く | ● |