Japanese Time Nouns Kinō and Ashita List: Ototoi to Asatte, Senshū to Rainen

Days: ototoi, kinō, kyō, ashita, asatte

The five day words are the backbone of Japanese small talk. Ototoi is the day before yesterday, kinō yesterday, kyō today, ashita tomorrow and asatte the day after tomorrow. They are nouns, which is why they take no to modify another noun, kinō no ban, yesterday evening, and can stand alone as an answer: itsu, when; ashita, tomorrow. In a sentence they sit before the verb without any particle, and carry wa when they are the topic of a contrast: kyō wa isogashii kedo, ashita wa hima desu.

Each of them has a formal partner used in writing and announcements: sakujitsu for kinō, honjitsu for kyō, asu or myōnichi for ashita, myōgonichi for asatte. You will see honjitsu on shop notices and hear asu on the weather forecast. In conversation, stay with the everyday forms.

Weeks, months and years: sen, kon, rai

Once you leave the single day, Japanese becomes almost mechanical. Three prefixes carry the meaning: sen, last; kon, this; rai, next. Attach them to shū, week, and you get senshū, konshū, raishū. Attach them to getsu, month, and you get sengetsu, kongetsu, raigetsu. Years are the one place the pattern breaks: kyonen is last year and kotoshi is this year, while rainen, next year, follows the rule. Two steps away, sensenshū is the week before last and saraishū the week after next; months and years work the same way.

These words carry no particle either. They often start a sentence and take wa when the speaker is contrasting or setting the scene: raishū wa shutchō desu, next week I am on a business trip. When they modify a noun they take no: raishū no getsuyōbi, next Monday, and here the Monday takes ni because it is an absolute day: raishū no getsuyōbi ni kaigi ga arimasu.

Parts of today: kesa, konban, kon'ya

Within a single day, Japanese has compact words for the parts that belong to today. Kesa is this morning, konban is this evening, and kon'ya is tonight, with konban leaning toward the early evening and kon'ya toward the night. Konban wa, good evening, is the same konban with a topic particle. There is no one-word this afternoon: use kyō no gogo. For other days, combine the day word with no and the part: kinō no asa, ashita no yoru, ototoi no ban.

The parts themselves are asa, morning; hiru, midday; gogo, afternoon; yūgata, early evening; ban or yoru, evening or night. As habits they appear with wa or without a particle: asa wa pan o tabemasu, I eat bread in the morning. Mainichi, maiasa and maiban, every day, morning and evening, are particle-free too, as are itsumo, always, and saikin, recently.

Short range: sakki, ima, ato de, kore kara

The words for the immediate past and future are the ones you use most, because most talk is about what just happened and what happens next. Sakki is a moment ago, the last few minutes or hours: sakki kita bakari, I just got here. Its polite form is saki hodo, which you will hear from staff: saki hodo no ken, the matter from earlier. Ima is now, and ima kara means from now. Kore kara is from here on, used for the plans immediately ahead. Ato de is later, and it always carries its particle, because ato is a noun meaning after and de marks the point: ato de renraku shimasu, I will get in touch later.

Sakki and ato de refer to the same day; for a more distant later, use kondo, next time or soon, and for earlier in general, kono mae, the other day. Mō sugu is very soon, and sono uchi is sometime, often a soft way to postpone.

When time words take ni and when they do not

The rule is short. Ni marks a fixed point on the clock or calendar: an hour, a date, a day of the week, a month by name, a year by number. It is not used after words that point from the speaker's now: kinō, kyō, ashita, konshū, raigetsu, kotoshi, kesa, sakki. A relative word already tells the listener where to look, so no anchor is needed, while a fixed point needs ni to attach it to the action.

Some words sit in between and take ni optionally: the seasons, haru ni or haru; the parts of the day, asa ni or asa; and expressions with a number of days, mikka ni for on the third versus mikka for three days. When a relative word modifies an absolute one with no, the absolute word decides: raishū no getsuyōbi ni.

• Clock times take ni: shichiji ni okimasu, I get up at seven
• Dates take ni: jūgonichi ni shiharaimasu, I pay on the fifteenth
• Days of the week take ni: kayōbi ni jugyō ga arimasu
• Months and years by name or number take ni: sangatsu ni, nisen sanjū nen ni
• Relative days never take ni: kinō, kyō, ashita, ototoi, asatte
• Relative weeks, months, years never take ni: senshū, kongetsu, rainen
• Parts of today never take ni: kesa, konban, kon'ya
• Sakki and ima take nothing; ato de always keeps de
• Frequency words take nothing: mainichi, maishū, itsumo, tokidoki

If you remember one line, remember this: if the English word contains yesterday, today, tomorrow, this, last or next, leave the ni out.

The full list of relative time nouns

The table collects every relative time noun from this post in one place, from the furthest past to the furthest future. The reading column gives the romaji, and the meaning column notes the formal variants where they exist.

Putting time nouns in the sentence

The natural position for a time word is early, before the subject or just after it; ashita at the very end sounds like an afterthought. Two time words stack from large to small, like a Japanese address: raishū no kin'yōbi no gogo sanji ni, at three in the afternoon next Friday. Only the last, absolute one carries ni.

Tense follows the time word. Kinō and senshū take the ta form; ashita and raishū take the plain or masu form, since Japanese has no separate future. Kyō can take either, depending on whether the event has happened yet: kyō asagohan o tabemashita, I ate breakfast today, is past because the eating is done.

Common mistakes with time nouns

The first mistake is adding ni to relative words: kinō ni, ashita ni, raishū ni. Japanese speakers will understand you, but it marks you as a learner instantly.

The second is dropping ni from absolute times because you have learned to drop it from kinō. Sanji ikimasu is missing its anchor; sanji ni ikimasu is right. Days of the week are the usual casualty: getsuyōbi kaigi ga arimasu needs ni after getsuyōbi.

The third is mixing the direction prefixes. Sen and kyo point back; rai points forward; kon and ko point at now. Saying raishū when you mean senshū moves a meeting by two weeks, and a listener will not always catch it. When it matters, add the date: raishū, jūhachinichi desu ne, next week, the eighteenth, right?