Japanese Pitch Accent for Common Verbs: Accented, Unaccented and How Forms Move

Two groups of verbs and one simple fact

Standard Tokyo Japanese marks words with a pitch pattern rather than stress. The voice starts on one level, may rise, and in some words drops sharply after one particular mora. That drop is the accent. For verbs, only two things can happen. Unaccented verbs, called heiban, start low, rise on the second mora and stay high until the end: iku is low-high, tsukau is low-high-high, hataraku is low-high-high-high. Accented verbs have the drop after the second-to-last mora of the dictionary form: ta↓beru is low-high-low, yo↓mu is high-low, hana↓su is low-high-low.

That single position, second-to-last mora, covers almost every accented verb, so you do not need to memorise where the fall is, only whether there is one. When the second-to-last mora is the second half of a vowel pair, as in ka↓eru or ha↓iru, the fall moves one mora earlier, which is why those verbs sound as if the accent is at the very front. A separate guide on this site covers pitch accent patterns for all word types.

What a pitch fall feels like in the mouth

A pitch fall is not a change of volume or a longer vowel. It is a drop in the note your voice is singing, like stepping down from one key on a piano to a lower one, and it happens between two moras, never in the middle of one. In ta↓beru the be is high and the ru is low; the step is between them.

To feel it, put a hand on your throat and say a↓me, rain, then ame, candy. On the first you should feel the voice relax slightly as the note drops after a. Now apply the same drop to a verb: mi↓ru, high on mi and stepping down on ru, then miru koto with koto staying low. Compare it with kiru, to wear, which stays level and hands its height to koto.

Unaccented verbs need practice too, because English speakers instinctively drop the pitch at the end of a word. Say the verb followed by a particle or noun and hold the plateau without letting it sag.

How the pattern moves in masu, te and nai forms

The masu form is the easiest case: every verb, from either group, takes a fall right after ma. Ikima↓su and tabema↓su have identical melodies. Ikimase↓n and tabemase↓n fall after se. Ikima↓shita and tabema↓shita fall after ma. Because polite speech erases the difference between the groups, learners who only use masu forms can go for years without noticing that verbs have two patterns.

The te form keeps the group. An unaccented verb stays flat: itte, katte, kiite, nete, tsukatte, hataraite. An accented godan verb keeps the fall where the dictionary form had it: yo↓nde from yo↓mu, ka↓ite from ka↓ku, hana↓shite from hana↓su, aru↓ite from aru↓ku, tsuku↓tte from tsuku↓ru. An accented ichidan verb moves the fall one mora earlier: ta↓bete from tabe↓ru, o↓kite from oki↓ru. The single-mora stems mi↓te and ki↓te and the irregular shi↓te and ki↓te keep a fall on their first mora.

The nai form also keeps the group. Unaccented verbs stay flat to the end: ikanai, kawanai, nenai, tsukawanai. Accented verbs put the fall on the mora just before nai: tabe↓nai, yoma↓nai, kaka↓nai, hanasa↓nai, kaera↓nai, oki↓nai. The irregulars are shina↓i and ko↓nai. The past ta form follows the te form exactly: yo↓nda, ta↓beta, itta.

Twenty high-frequency verbs with their patterns

The table lists twenty verbs you use daily. The reading column shows the dictionary form with a downward arrow after the accented mora, or no arrow for an unaccented verb. The final column gives the te and nai forms with the same marking so that you can see the movement. Every masu form is accented on ma, so it is not repeated in each row.

Notice that the two groups do not line up with godan and ichidan. Neru and oshieru are ichidan and unaccented; taberu and miru are ichidan and accented. Iku and kau are godan and unaccented; yomu and kaku are godan and accented. Conjugation type and pitch group are two independent facts about a verb.

Listening for the fall in real speech

In connected speech the accent is easiest to hear on the mora after the fall, not on the accented mora itself. Train yourself to listen for the low tail. In taberu koto, the ru and koto are all low; in iku koto, everything after i is high. With the particle to, or a following noun, the contrast becomes obvious: no↓mu hito, a person who drinks, dips after no, while kau hito, a person who buys, stays up.

Use the verb-plus-koto test whenever you meet a new verb. Ask a native speaker, or the AI Sensei, to say the verb followed by koto: low koto means accented, high means unaccented. Write the verb in your notebook with an arrow or a zero, and drill the four-form chain once.

Common mistakes by first language

The verb rules are the same for everyone, but the errors that spoil them depend on the melody your first language already uses. Find yours below and fix that first.

• English speakers: dropping the pitch at the end of every verb, which turns unaccented iku and kau into accented-sounding words. Fix: hold the plateau through the final mora and onto the particle.
• English speakers: making the accented mora louder and longer instead of stepping down after it. Fix: keep volume even and change only the note.
• Spanish and Italian speakers: placing a stress on the second-to-last syllable of every verb, which is right for taberu but wrong for oshieru. Fix: learn the group, not the position.
• French speakers: a final rise on the last mora, which masks every fall. Fix: end verbs level or falling, never rising, unless the sentence is a question.
• Chinese speakers: giving each mora its own tone, so ta-be-ru becomes three separate notes. Fix: think in one rise and at most one fall per verb.
• Korean speakers: producing the fall too gently, so accented and unaccented verbs merge. Fix: exaggerate the step down at first, then reduce it.
• Everyone: assuming the polite masu form reveals the group. It does not. Fix: learn the dictionary form and the koto test.

A self-check routine with the AI Sensei

Ten minutes a day is enough. First, hum the twenty verbs in the table, then say them. Second, say the four-form chain for five verbs, alternating an unaccented verb with an accented one. Third, hold a short conversation with the AI Sensei about your daily routine, using plain forms where you can: okiru, taberu, iku, hataraku, kaeru, neru. Fourth, ask the Sensei to say three verbs with koto and tell it whether each was accented or not.

After the conversation, read the feedback. Pay attention to two things only: unaccented verbs where you let the pitch sag at the end, and accented verbs where the fall was missing or landed on the wrong mora. Repeat those verbs in the chain, then let the rest go. Over a few weeks the flagged list shrinks and the melody becomes automatic.

When the melody still will not settle

If a verb keeps coming out wrong, isolate the shape from the sound. Hum the verb, then whisper it, then say it. If the hum is right and the spoken form is wrong, the problem is the consonants distracting you, and slower speech fixes it. If the hum itself is wrong, you have the group wrong: check it with the koto test and rewrite the note in your notebook.

Pitch mistakes rarely stop people understanding you; they just sound foreign. Fix the twenty verbs here first, because they end most of your sentences.