KanjiPadHow to Write Hello in Japanese — こんにちは
こんにちは
“Hello” in Japanese is こんにちは, pronounced konnichiwa — four beats, kon-ni-chi-wa, with no stress on any one of them. It is written entirely in hiragana, five characters, eleven strokes in total.
こんにちは is the daytime greeting. It covers roughly late morning to early evening, which makes it the safe default when you meet someone in the middle of the day and are not sure how formal to be. Before about ten in the morning you would say おはようございます instead, and after dark こんばんは.
One warning about register: こんにちは is a greeting for people you are not with all day. Japanese speakers do not say it to family at breakfast, or to a colleague they already greeted at nine. Between close friends it can even sound oddly stiff.
Literally, it is half a sentence. こんにちは began as 今日は — kon-nichi wa, “as for this day…” — the opening of a longer polite enquiry about how someone’s day was going. The rest of the sentence fell away over time and the fragment became the greeting.
Writing こんにちは, character by character
11 strokes in all. Each animation plays once — press ↻ to watch it again.
- こ1
Stroke order
Two short strokes, both curving the same way, written top then bottom — never joined.
- ん2
Stroke order
A single stroke. The only kana that is a consonant on its own.
- に3
Stroke order
Three strokes: the left vertical first, then the two short horizontals on the right.
- ち4
Stroke order
Two strokes. The horizontal comes first, then the long curved stroke through it.
- は5
Stroke order
This is は, the kana for ha — but here it is read wa. It is the leftover topic particle from 今日は, and particle は is always pronounced wa.
Write it yourself
Reading stroke order is not the same as owning it. Draw こんにちは one character at a time and see whether your hand agrees with the animation.
Variants and politeness
Japanese greets by time of day, so “hello” splits into three:
- おはようございますohayō gozaimasu
- Morning, until about 10 or 11am. Drop the ございます to おはよう with friends and family.
- こんにちはkonnichiwa
- Midday to early evening. The neutral default.
- こんばんはkonbanwa
- After dark. Same construction — the は on the end is again read wa.
- もしもしmoshi moshi
- Answering the phone. Never used face to face.
Common mistakes
- Writing こんにちわSpelling it the way it sounds is the single most common error, and Japanese readers notice it instantly. The last character is は.
- Using it at breakfast, or at nightこんにちは is daytime only. At 8am it reads as odd; after dark use こんばんは.
- Greeting the same person twiceUnlike English “hi”, こんにちは is not repeated through the day. A nod or お疲れ様です is what people use the second time.
More everyday phrases
Practise こんにちは stroke by stroke — the app grades every stroke as you write it.