High and low, not loud and soft
Say “REcord” (a noun) and “reCORD” (a verb) in English: you change which syllable is louder. In Japanese all beats keep the same loudness and length; what changes is whether the voice sits high or low on each one, like two notes on a piano.
The drop is what matters. Every word has at most one place where pitch falls from high to low. That place is called the accent. Words with no fall are called flat.
The first two beats differ. In Tokyo Japanese, if the first beat is low the second is high, and if the first is high the second is low. So a word never starts on two highs or two lows.
The four patterns
Linguists name the patterns by where the drop falls. Every Tokyo word fits one of these four.
Words told apart by pitch
These pairs are written with the same kana. In speech, pitch and context separate them; in writing, the kanji do. H marks a high beat and L a low one, with the following particle in brackets.
| Word | Meaning | Pitch |
|---|---|---|
| hashi | chopsticks | HL (L) |
| hashi | bridge | LH (L) |
| hashi | edge | LH (H) |
| ame | rain | HL (L) |
| ame | sweet, candy | LH (H) |
| kaki | oyster | HL (L) |
| kaki | persimmon | LH (H) |
| ima | now | HL (L) |
How dictionaries show pitch
Japanese accent dictionaries, and many learner dictionaries, give a number for each word: the beat after which the pitch drops. 0 means it never drops.
Pitch across a sentence
In a sentence, each phrase (a word plus its particles) carries its own pitch shape, and the whole sentence drifts slowly downward. Listen to the shape of each phrase.
More pitch pairs
Three more pairs, in the same H (high) and L (low) notation as the table above. 花 and 鼻 sound identical on their own; only the particle after them shows the difference.
How to practise pitch
A short routine.
Check yourself
Say each with the right pitch, then open the answer.
- chopsticks
Show answer
hashiHL - bridge
Show answer
hashiLH, particle low - rain
Show answer
ameHL - candy
Show answer
ameLH - rice wine
Show answer
sakeLH
Tokyo, Osaka and the rest of Japan
Pitch accent differs by region. Standard Japanese, taught here and used on national television, follows Tokyo. Osaka and Kyoto (the Kansai region) have a different system, and in some areas of the north-east and Kyushu, words carry no fixed pitch at all.
| Word | Tokyo | Osaka (approximate) |
|---|---|---|
| 箸 はし chopsticks | HL | LH |
| 橋 はし bridge | LH(L) | HL |
| 雨 あめ rain | HL | LH |
Japanese speakers from different regions understand each other without trouble. Pitch matters for sounding natural more than for being understood. Start by copying the audio, and look up the pitch of words you use every day.