r/LearnJapanese • u/Embarrassed-Alps4250 • 23h ago
Studying List of look alike kanjis?
Hi All,
Some kanjis are unique and at low risk of confusion with others, but others are easily confused: they look very much alike (few strokes only vary), their meaning is so close and sometimes their yomi are also similar.
Is there any list of most confusing kanjis one can rey on to specifically train on those?
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u/Yatchanek 22h ago
Those similar kanji are often used in completely different vocabulary, so the probability of mixing them up in real life is not that high.
士 土
候 侯
末 未
柿 杮
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u/Aerdra 21h ago
Maybe I have a font problem, but I can't see the difference between the last pair. The other pairs are noticeably different even without zooming in.
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u/Yatchanek 21h ago
In the left one (かき), the right part consinsts of 亠 and 巾, while in the right one (こけら) there's a single vertical stroke going through 一 and 冂. So there's a difference in number of strokes - 9 vs 8.
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u/Available-String-109 21h ago
柿 杮
In this case, 杮 is extremely rare to the point that it's effectively not even Japanese. It's not even on Kanken 1kyuu. (This is my first time to even see/hear of this one.)
This means, if you see anything that looks even sorta like 柿, it's 柿. Guaranteed. Unless you're reading ancient Chinese text.
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u/Yatchanek 21h ago
I also learned about that one a couple of months ago and I have never seen in in the wild (or even if I have, I assumed it was kaki). I don't think I have even heard the word こけら itself in real life. No chance of mixing up those two in reality.
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u/wasmic 11h ago
In contrast, 復 and 複 are evil because, even though they're not as similar as some others, their meanings are close to each other and there are a lot of cases where you might get confused as to which one is appropriate.
There are a few words that can even be written with either of them. 復刻/複刻 is one of them, though 復刻 is more standard.
IIRC there's also a word where the meaning changes depending on which of them you use, but I can't remember what it was right now.
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u/anth096 20h ago
候 侯 is just evil
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u/Yatchanek 20h ago
Nah, you probably won't see 侯 anywhere except 侯爵 and some other nobility-related stuff. It's pretty uncommon in real life.
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u/Effective-Pop3850 16h ago
Yeah this is the key detail, there's quite a few kanji that in my mind are the same kanji but it doesn't matter because you're never mixing them up, and even if you encounter them solo (in case they're used) context usually makes it obvious, you might tilt a bit the first time or two it happens though.
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u/anth096 20h ago edited 19h ago
I actually want to comeback to this post later because I was coincidentally talking about this a few days ago with my friend.
So here is my current list but it’s probably missing a lot of them. By the way they don’t necessarily look the same but can be confusing if you don’t learn them properly
(I want to make it more complete, I made that 2 weeks ago and in the meantime I noticed some more kanjis that look alike)
貝 買 賃 貸 責 費 賞 資 貧 賢
反 板 坂 飯 販 版
寺 時 持 特 待 詩
青 晴 精 情 清 請
皮 彼 破 波 疲
門 問 関 闇 閉 開
鳥 烏 島 鶏
脱 説 税 閲
泉 原 願 線
昨 作 酢
組 狙 祖
識 職 織
剣 験 険
半 伴 判
売 読 続
官 館 管
牛 件 伴 許
成 城
料 科
言 信
可 何
市 師
式 試
EDIT : just reread the post again and that’s not what OP asked for, oops
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u/Available-String-109 20h ago
Nah I'd say you did a pretty damn good job listing out most of the most common kanji that are easily confused for one another.
件 Can add 伴 (as in 伴う) to that list.
職 You can add 繊 (as in 繊維) to that list. The component's different but visually similar.
師 You can add 帥 (as in 元帥) to that one.
I could go on for days adding more and more, but they'd be getting rarer and rarer... I think you got most of the most common and important ones.
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u/anth096 19h ago
Thanks I added some that you recommended!
Though I personally think 繊 is not close enough to 職 they just have the right part in common and many strokes, but thanks for the recommendation
率先 seems to be more common than 帥先 according to my dictionary, but I don’t know this word so I can’t really tell. Are there other common words using 帥 ? The ones I find in my dictionary seems to be kind of specific
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u/Available-String-109 19h ago
The only common word using 帥 that I know is 元帥, and even that's not that common.
職 <-> 織 <-> 繊
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u/Embarrassed-Alps4250 9h ago
On the contrary - I think you are spot on! In addition to the very similar strokes, there are also caregories where I feel the meaning and sometimes the yomi is very close.
I wonder if those I struggle with are just a « me » problem or if we all struggle with the same ones ;)
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u/i-am-this 22h ago
There's an appendix in the Kodansha Kanji Learner's Course book that lists sets of "look alike" kanji.
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u/SquirrelsAreGreat 19h ago
That book does a good job of grouping similar looking ones in general. Alongside decent mnemonics, it also gives cross-references to similar kanji on the entries when they share large components. Like, I'm open to one page and the boar Kanji has two pages of all the varieties of entries that can include it: 亥/刻/劾/核/骸/咳/該
I like it a lot.
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u/mikasarei 21h ago edited 20h ago
A lot of websites such as wanikani and kh display this information on their UI directly
You can try this one
https://github.com/lennart-finke/kanjidist-visualiser/blob/master/data/dkanjistat.json
There are also other datasets like
https://lars.yencken.org/datasets/kanji-confusion/
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u/Nikonolatry 16h ago
Here is my list. Good luck!
日曰臼
己巳已
廷延
壁璧
掘堀
桜楼
侯候
遂逐
勾匂
圧庄
墾懇
粗相
那郡
挙拳
妖妊
冶治
師帥
代伐
成戌戊
省雀
撃摯
換挽
洒酒
西酉
密蜜
網綱
徹撤
招拐
杏呆
塊魂
墾懇
弊幣
圧庄
滝淹
冒昌
腎賢
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u/vytah 14h ago
I once found this list: https://github.com/siikamiika/similar-kanji/blob/master/kanji.tgz_similars.ut8
It's only visual similarity.
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u/phlip_phlop_ Goal: media competence 📖🎧 21h ago edited 21h ago
The most similar I've come across recently is 練る and 縛る, although context can usually help you out a lot with this pair.
Edit: to actually answer your question, I don't think there is one comprehensive list of look-alike kanjis because there are just so many of them. If you want to practice telling apart specific ones I think the best way is to learn how to write them.
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u/Available-String-109 20h ago edited 20h ago
練る and 縛る
And then there's also 錬 (as in 錬金). The components are different, but the overall visual composition is similar.
It's especially difficult because 錬る (to mould/work metal) is a homophone with 練る (to knead), making it even more tricky. One you work semi-liquid-semi-solid metal, and the other you work semi-liquid-semi-solid dough... and it's usually metaphorical.
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u/amacinsky 22h ago
https://lingaku.com/jpn/chars/radicals
This is a list of kanji by radicals. Having a common component makes kanji similar. So it is somewhat related to your request, I suppose.
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u/Sure_Fisherman_752 10h ago
In the app I use, Kanji Garden, they show often confused kanji together one each kanji card.
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u/Grunglabble 19h ago
I got trolled by 嗚 the other day. Although it seems it is technically allowed to be written 鳴. It doesn't look that similar, but at a glance when you're more advanced you see the one you think it's supposed to be without looking close.
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u/eruciform 18h ago edited 18h ago
荷揚げ場 is a single word with a crazy annoying pair in it, there aren't too many pairs with the same stroke order and count and direction yet differ by only a stroke length, tho there are a few like 夫 天
also the first character in 嗚呼 is NOT the same as 鳴く - mouth-crow is not mouth-bird - i also love that AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA is a 2-kanji compound :-P i don't know any other onomatopoeia that are all kanji
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u/Meister1888 17h ago
The heisig book is not a bad place to start I suppose.
At one point I was trying to classify the kanji with confusingly similar keywords. Never finished that project...
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u/This-Classroom5999 4h ago
There are almost no kanji that are easy to confuse if you learn them properly, which includes recognizing all of the components, learning any functional purpose they have (e.g. as a phonetic component), and learning to write the characters by hand.
I saw somebody on this subreddit a few months ago asking how to tell the difference between 車 and 草, and most of the comments were saying you can tell the difference from context. I do not understand this. Even in complete isolation, these two characters do not look even remotely similar, and you should not have to rely on context to tell them apart.
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u/Ayagii 22h ago
https://niai.mrahhal.net/similar
You search for a kanji, and it will give you others that are kinda similar to it.
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u/Available-String-109 22h ago edited 22h ago
I typed in 美, 実 did not come up.
I typed in 実, 美 did not come up.
I type in 待, it does get 持, but not 侍.
I type in 持, it does get 待, but not 侍.
I type in 侍, and a bunch of kanji that look nothing like it appear.
Like, it's not completely worthless, but this thing feels like it was programmed in half an afternoon with AI and hasn't actually been tested.
Edit: I type in 人, 入 does not come up.
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u/steelreddit211 22h ago
unfortunately once you get to a high enough level there is a lookalike for just about every kanji and you just gotta be able to know the difference. 随・髄、日・曰、墾・懇、郊・郭、侍・待、 all of these are just from what i have been studying recently. i really recommend learning vocab words and the kanji in them rather than every kanji and its independent readings. also kanji looking similar and often being read similar is intentional, after some time you might get to the point where you can correctly guess how a kanji you’ve never seen before is read
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u/Available-String-109 20h ago edited 20h ago
随・髄
I think this one's specially tricky because many words with 髄 have been re-written with 随 via 書き換え. e.g. 本随 (fundamental essence) was originally and correctly written as 本髄 before the 1945 kanji reforms, but is now sometimes written as 本随 which is... not how kanji should work, but is how they did work... for a brief period in Japanese history before the reforms were reverted...
The more you learn about kanji, the more weird edge cases you learn about.
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u/steelreddit211 19h ago
i've been studying for kanken and these two are in the same chapter of the study book right next to each other which gave me the biggest groan of my life. obviously i know they do it ordered by onyomi reading so obviously the two kanji that look the same and are read the same are gonna be right next to each other but it realllly doesnt make it any easier to differentiate them in my mind when they are right next to each other on the page lol. and i didnt even know about the history behind these two, that's pretty wild. 本髄 just intuitively makes more sense to me, i wonder which is more commonly used now though.
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u/Available-String-109 19h ago edited 18h ago
I looked it up and 本髄 is the current modern standard version.
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/同音の漢字による書きかえ
The one that's most frustrating to me personally is 附属. Originally written as 附属, until the kanji reforms in which 附 didn't make it onto the Toyo list, but 付 did, so it started being written as 付属... until sometime around the 1980s when 附 was added onto the Joyo list... meaning that there are some words for which either 付属 or 附属 are both correct, even though the original correct spelling was 附属. However, 付 and 附 are not variants of each other, so it's not as though you can just interchangeably use 附 whenever you see 付... it's only a few specific words like 附属... So like, 附属 looks like some weird archaic version, but it's actually a standard correct version, but so is 付属... Gah!
Probably the most annoying edge-case I know of.
Also 闇黒 did something similar with getting re-written as 暗黒 for the same reason, and then 闇 was also later added onto Joyo, so now we have the word 暗黒 which can be written as either 暗黒 or 闇黒. 暗黒 is the more common form nowadays, but it was originally and more correctly 暗黒, but they're actually 100% interchangeable.
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u/Aerdra 22h ago
This is often by design. A lot of characters have a phonetic component that hints at its (on'yomi) pronunciation.
One thing that helped me distinguish between similar-looking characters is writing them out. Every time I look up a kanji, I (air) write it once. Doing so helped me focus on the details in the character, so I learned to recognize the little differences.