Different Groups Of Verbs In Japanese

Verbs are important part of any language since they give us a lot of information about a sentence. Imagine trying to state anything without using verbs!

This article on its own might not be very useful, since it only deals with classifying verbs, but it's very important gateway to any kind of conjugation you'd like to preform on a verb. For example, to say "I want to eat", you have to turn 「食べる」taberu to 「食べたい」tabetai, to say "I didn't speak", you have to turn 「話す」hanasu to 「話さなかった」hanasanakatta, to say "I don't want to die", you have to turn 「死ぬ」shinu to 「死にたくない」shinitakunai.

The way the verb changes depends on a group it belongs to, and you can learn more about them and the way they affect conjugation by reading this article.

The Five Groups

Japanese language classifies verbs into five groups.

1. Five-row group 「五段動詞」【ご・だん・どうし】
2. Upper one-row group 「上一段動詞」【かみ・いち・だん・どうし】
3. Lower one-row group 「下一段動詞」【しも・いち・だん・どうし】
4. Sa-column irregular group 「さ行変格動詞」【さ・ぎょう・へんかく・どうし】
5. Ka-column irregular group 「か行変格動詞」【か・ぎょう・へんかく・どうし】

There's absolutely no need to worry about the last two groups since they actually contain only one verb each. The first irregular verb is 「する」suru ("to do") and the other one is 「来る」kuru ("to come"). Everything else belongs to either five-row group or one of the one-row groups.

Firstly, let's clear up the names of these groups. The row and column are referring to the 「五十音」【ごじゅうおん】gojuuon. Gojuuon is a Japanese ordering of a kana, i.e. a 5x10 grid which contains all of the basic kana characters.

	わ行	ら行	や行	ま行	は行	な行	た行	さ行	か行	あ行
ん	わ	ら	や	ま	は	な	た	さ	か	あ	あ段
	〇	り	〇	み	ひ	に	ち	し	き	い	い段
	〇	る	ゆ	む	ふ	ぬ	つ	す	く	う	う段
	〇	れ	〇	め	へ	ね	て	せ	け	え	え段
	を	ろ	よ	も	ほ	の	と	そ	こ	お	お段
五十音【ごじゅうおん】

How To Determine Where A Verb Belongs To

The ultimate and most correct answer would be a dictionary and memorization, but there are a few clues that can help you.

• If a verb is 「する」suru or「来る」kuru, it belongs to its respectful category of irregular verbs.
• If a verb rhymes with いる (iru), it's upper one-row verb. 
• If a verb rhymes with える (eru), it's lower one-row verb.
• Otherwise, it's a five-row verb.

The problem here is that, as always, there are exceptions, and you have to memorize them. To check it a verb belongs to one of the one-row groups or the five-row group, take a peek at the dictionary. They're usually labeled with "(v1)" and "(d5)", and I guess you get which one refers to which group, right? You can easily determine if it's upper or lower one it's a one-row verb by applying the described rules with rhyming.

Determining the group of a verb

If term "rhyming" is confusing you, here's another explanation, which is actually simpler but that's the way it's taught in Japanese, and I personally don't think it's the right way to do things. Anyway, you can simply write the verb in romaji! Then just see if it ends in iru or eru.

Verb Stems

Verb stems are sort of a base of the verb that stays the same as you change it through tenses and their other forms. In English, the stem of the verb is the same as its usual present form (which you find in dictionary), so you never thought about it that way. For example, take the English verb to play. To change it to past tense, you add ~ed to it, and you get played. To change it to its continuous form, you add ~ing and get playing.

It's similar with Japanese, with the exception that stem is not the same as verb's dictionary form. For example, stem of 「寝る」neru ("to sleep") is 「寝」ne.

So, how to determine a stem of a verb in Japanese?

For five-row verbs, you find the last kana of it in the gojuun and change it with the kana which is just above it. Alternatively, you write it in romaji and turn the final u into i. However, if you're using the alternate way be careful about su and tsu.

⑤　はなす　→　はなし　⑤

For one-row verbs (both upper and lower), you simply drop the final る (ru).

①　しんじる　→　しんじ　①

As for the the two irregular cases, you just memorize them. Stem for 「する」suru is 「し」shi and stem for 「来る」kuru is 「来（き）」ki.

する　→　し

くる　→　き

Exceptions

The way to determine if verb belongs to five-row or one-row group works most of the time, but there are some exceptions.

There are some verbs which rhyme with (iru) or (eru), but belong to the five-row verbs nevertheless. The following is the list of the some of the commonly used verbs which fall into this category.

• 「入る」【はいる】hairu ("to enter")
• 「走る」【はしる】hashiru ("to run")
• 「要る」【いる】iru ("to need")
• 「帰る」【かえる】kaeru ("to return")
• 「限る」【かぎる】kagiru ("to limit")
• 「切る」【きる】kiru ("to cut")
• 「喋る」【しゃべる】shaberu ("to talk")
• 「知る」【しる】shiru ("to know")

There's another thing which is important to mention. There are two very commonly used verbs that imply state of being: 「ある」 and 「いる」, both meaning "to be". The first one is used for inanimate object and the second one for living things.

Theoretically, 「ある」 belongs to five-row verbs, and 「いる」 belongs to upper one-row verbs, but the way they change is very, very different.

Practice

Try to determine which group the following verbs belong to. Take a look at the flowchart above if you're unsure. I didn't include any exceptions here.

verb	translation	solution
買う【かう】	to buy	five-row verb
遊ぶ【あそぶ】	to play	five-row verb
寝る【ねる】	to sleep	lower one-row verb
出る【でる】	to come out	lower one-row verb
翔る【かける】	to soar	lower one-row verb
待つ【まつ】	to wait	five-row verb
起きる【おきる】	to wake up	upper one-row verb
死ぬ【しぬ】	to die	five-row
highlight the solution to see it

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