Hiragana · r row
る (ru): hiragana stroke order and pronunciation
る is the hiragana for ru, the u sound of the r row. It is written with one stroke. Its katakana twin is ル (ru).
- Romaji
- ru
- Strokes
- 1
- Listen
- Play ru
How to say ru
Tip: tapped 'ru' — soft
In words
The course does not attach an example word to る when it introduces it; you will meet it in the lessons that follow.
The r row
The r row keeps one consonant and runs through the five vowels, so る differs from its neighbours only in the vowel. Reading the row as a set fixes the pattern:
Course words written with る
One word from the beginner word lists use る. Each links to the list it belongs to.
- たべる食べるtaberuto eatFood and drink vocabulary
る in a sentence
From the beginner stories, where る turns up in running text rather than on its own.
ぼくは かいしゃに はしる。
I run to the office. from The day off
ユミは ぼくの かおを みる。
Yumi looks at my face. from The day off
Built from る
The same sound in katakana
Stroke-order data from KanjiVG by Ulrich Apel, licensed CC BY-SA 3.0.
Practice this in Open Lingo
The Open Lingo Japanese course teaches る with tracing practice, a listening drill and spaced review, then uses it in real words within the same lesson.
Keep going
- ChartKatakana chartAll 46 basic katakana plus voiced and yōon combinations, with romaji, stroke-order diagrams, example loanwords and audio.
- Word listGreetings and polite phrasesEssential Japanese greetings and polite phrases for beginners, with hiragana, romaji, meaning and audio, taken from the Open Lingo course.
- Word listNumbersJapanese numbers for beginners: Sino-Japanese いち, に, さん, the native ひとつ, ふたつ counting set, and hundreds, thousands and 万, with audio.
- ToolNumbers 1 to 100 and converterJapanese numbers 0 to 100 in kana, kanji and romaji, a converter up to 999,999, and the rules for 4, 7, 9, sound-changing hundreds and 万.