100 Most Common Japanese Verbs With Example Sentences

The three verb groups and why they decide everything

Japanese has only three verb classes, and the class decides every form you will ever build. Ichidan verbs end in iru or eru and simply drop the final ru: taberu becomes tabemasu, mieru becomes miemasu. Godan verbs change the final u sound to the matching i sound: nomu becomes nomimasu, kaku becomes kakimasu, matsu becomes machimasu, hanasu becomes hanashimasu. Only two verbs are irregular, suru and kuru, and they give shimasu and kimasu.

That is the whole system. The dedicated conjugation guide covers the te-form, the plain past and potential forms in detail, so this page stays on the vocabulary itself. What you should take from it is the habit of recording the group with the word, because a verb whose group you cannot name is a verb you cannot use in any tense except the one you memorised.

The ru-verb trap

The rule that iru and eru endings mean ichidan is reliable most of the time, but a small group of extremely common verbs breaks it. These are godan verbs that happen to end in ru, so they take rimasu, not masu. Kaeru means to go home and gives kaerimasu; the ichidan verb kaeru, written 変える, means to change something and gives kaemasu. The pair sounds identical in the dictionary form and separates the moment you conjugate.

Learn this list as a block rather than meeting the exceptions one by one. Kiru with the meaning to cut is godan and gives kirimasu, while kiru meaning to wear is ichidan and gives kimasu. Iru meaning to need is godan and gives irimasu, while iru meaning to exist is ichidan and gives imasu. Getting these wrong is the single most audible beginner slip in spoken Japanese.

Notice that the trap only exists in the dictionary form. Once you have heard someone say kaerimasu or hairimasu a few times, the correct form starts to feel like the natural one, which is why these verbs belong in your spoken drills rather than on a flashcard you only read.

The particle is part of the verb

English speakers usually store a verb as a single word and add prepositions later. Japanese does not work that way: the verb selects its particle, and the choice often disagrees with the English translation. You meet a person with ni, not with to. You board a train with ni and leave it with o. You understand something with ga, because wakaru describes what becomes clear rather than an action you perform on it.

The particles guide explains what each particle means in general. Here the practical move is narrower: whenever you write down a verb, write the noun slot in front of it too, as in densha ni noru or tomodachi ni au. That two-word chunk is what you will actually retrieve when you speak.

Existence and change, and the pairs that come together

Japanese frequently gives you two verbs where English gives one: an intransitive verb describing what happens by itself, and a transitive verb describing what someone does. The door opens is doa ga akimasu; I open the door is doa o akemasu. Almost every pair follows the same particle logic, ga for the thing that changes and o for the thing you act on, so learning one pair teaches you the shape of the rest.

Two more verbs sit at the centre of this group. Aru and iru both mean to exist, split by animacy: iru for people and animals, aru for objects, plans and events. Naru means to become and takes ni for nouns and na-adjectives, as in byōki ni narimashita.

Movement verbs and where they point

Movement verbs are the first place particles get tested, because destination, route and exit point all use different markers. Ni and e mark where you are heading, o marks the space you move through or leave, and de marks the means of transport. Iku, kuru and kaeru also carry a viewpoint: kuru means movement toward where the speaker is, so a Japanese speaker says ima ikimasu when English would say I am coming now.

Iku is godan but has one irregular form worth memorising now: its te-form is itte, not iite. You will use it constantly in itte kimasu, said when leaving the house, and in requests such as itte kudasai.

Giving and receiving

Japanese chooses the verb according to the direction of the gift. Ageru is used when the giver is you or your side, kureru when someone gives to you or your side, and morau when you are the receiver taking the perspective of the receiving. English uses give for the first two, so this is a genuine new distinction rather than a translation problem. A useful check: if the sentence would make you say kindly gave me, the verb is almost certainly kureru.

Speech, thought and knowing

This group contains the verbs that keep a conversation alive when your vocabulary runs out. Iu quotes with to, omou takes to for the content of a thought, and kiku covers both listening and asking, which is why sensei ni kikimasu means I will ask the teacher rather than I will listen to the teacher.

Two verbs deserve special care. Wakaru takes ga and describes understanding as something that arrives, so wakarimashita means I have got it, not I understood at some past moment. Shiru is stranger: the plain present shirimasu is rarely used, the affirmative is shitte imasu, and the negative is shirimasen, never shitte imasen.

The core verb reference table

Use this as a lookup rather than a memorisation target. The particle column shows the marker that normally sits in front of the verb, and the romaji column gives the dictionary form with the masu form in brackets so you can check the group instantly.

Verbs made with suru

A large share of Japanese verbs are simply a noun plus suru, which means every noun you learn is a potential verb. They all conjugate identically, so learning suru properly gives you hundreds of verbs at once. Most of them take o on the noun that follows, though a few, such as denwa suru and renraku suru, take ni for the person.

• 勉強する benkyō suru, to study: nihongo o benkyō shimasu
• 練習する renshū suru, to practise: hatsuon o renshū shimasu
• 電話する denwa suru, to phone: tomodachi ni denwa shimasu
• 連絡する renraku suru, to get in touch: ashita renraku shimasu
• 説明する setsumei suru, to explain: riyū o setsumei shimasu
• 確認する kakunin suru, to confirm: yoyaku o kakunin shimasu
• 予約する yoyaku suru, to book: seki o yoyaku shimasu
• 案内する annai suru, to show around: kaigishitsu ni go-annai shimasu
• 掃除する sōji suru, to clean: heya o sōji shimasu
• 料理する ryōri suru, to cook: yūhan o ryōri shimasu
• 心配する shinpai suru, to worry: shinpai shinaide kudasai
• 用意する yōi suru, to prepare: shiryō o yōi shimasu

Twenty verbs in full sentences

These twenty sentences use the verbs you will reach for most often, and each one is ordinary enough to reuse today with only the nouns swapped. Say each aloud at natural speed, then immediately produce a second version with a noun from your own life before moving on to the next line. If a sentence stalls, the missing piece is usually the particle rather than the verb.

How to turn this list into speech

Reading a verb table builds recognition, and recognition is not what fails you in conversation. What fails is retrieval under time pressure with the right particle attached. The drills below are designed for that gap, and they take minutes rather than sessions.

• Learn verbs in transitive and intransitive pairs so the particle contrast is built in from the first exposure.
• For each new verb, say three sentences: present polite, past polite, and a request with te kudasai.
• Keep a list of the verbs you actually reached for and could not find; that list is your real syllabus.
• Drill the ru-verb trap set once a week until kaerimasu and hairimasu come out without thought.
• Record yourself describing your morning in ten sentences and count how many different verbs you used.
• When you meet a new noun, ask which verb it goes with, then store the pair rather than the noun alone.