Is being able to write kanji from your memory realistically useful in an everyday life in Japan?

43 comments

1. You’ll get different answers to this, but in general even if you live in Japan, you probably don’t need to handwrite that many kanji unless you have certain jobs that might require it.

   I do think it’s good to develop the ability to make a handwritten kanji look decent (even if you are copying it), and some people find that writing kanji engage a different part of the memory and help them remember them.

2. I’ll tell ya right now that learning to write at least the 常用 kanji ain’t so bad – just do rote memorization, throw on some music – it’s rather fun. Stroke order matters 💯

3. I do it for memorization but even my Japanese teacher often forgot how to write a kanji though they can always read them, I think word processors make the need to actually physically write them redundant in everyday life.

4. For foreigners working at a Japanese firm, kanji writing skills might be (significantly) less important than listening, speaking, and reading skills. But that depends on an individual’s situation.

   All my Japanese friends and work colleagues handwrite kanji all the time (notes at work, forms, personal notes, letters, etc.). Japan makes and sells a lot of pens and pencils. My friends told me they forget how to write more kanji and stroke orders the longer they are out school. Most of my friends are in Tokyo and college graduates, but some are not, working in restaurants, cafes, and trades.

   Maybe the situation is different in smaller cities and towns.

5. This feels a bit like asking “as long as you understand English, do you really need to know spelling?”. Well, maybe I’m exaggerating, but I think the process of writing is very important in memorizing kanji.

   To answer your question, I think at least you should know how to write your address, personal and health info (such as chronic illness etc) in kanji, these are probably the kanji one uses the most in their daily life IMO.

6. The kanji that I would say is most important to learn are those in your address, occupation, and other things you need to use to fill out at the city office, or for immigration.

   You normally need to write those out by hand.

7. While I can’t speak on behalf of Japanese people and can only glance from YouTube videos of people being asked how to write incredibly compilcated Kanji, that you might not need to know how to write all the Kanji.

   It’s probably much more likely you will want a grasp on how to read Kanji rather well, Understanding the underlying vocabulary and perhaps pronunciation.

   But learning to write Kanji has in my opinion increased my ability to read them rather significantly and forces me to engage with them a little more. So it might not be a bad thing to learn them, even if you might botch their writing every now and again.

8. If you’re a kinesthetic learner knowing the writing pattern can help engrain the meaning into your memory better. It can also help with kanji lookup since stroke order is important for most recognition algorithms.

   Generally though rather than learning to write every single kanji on a case-by-case basis, it would probably be a better idea to just focus on learning the stroke order of the ~200 radicals or common component kanji that function as de facto radicals like 回. The “left to right, top to bottom” guideline you hear repeated often doesn’t always apply to how each radical is written, but the vast majority of kanji are drawn radical-by-radical in “blocks,” and that guideline almost always applies to how the radicals are drawn in sequence. So if you know how to write the radicals, you will know how to write almost every kanji you encounter.

9. If you live in Japan being able to write your address is important, and maybe some other associated kanji, but I lived there for five years and that was generally the most I ever had to write. Sometimes if I mailed things I had to write what was in the box. I could look up the kanji, but knowing how to write it (stroke order) is important in that case. So I think you should practice it but you don’t necessarily have to have it all memorized.

10. Useful for me, I need to write by hand everyday.

11. I think the only thing I wrote in kanji this year was my address on official papers?

12. Depends on what you mean by “handwrite kanji.” Do you mean be able to perfectly write all 2,000 or whatever joyo kanji? No, completely unnecessary. Being able to write simple everyday kanji, maybe idk, up to Elementary school 3rd grade level? Arguably quite useful, especially if you work in a more analog office.

    When I have meetings in Japanese, a lot of time I jot down memos on paper (office is not tech friendly) and it’s nice to be able to switch between English and Japanese freely. If someone’s not at their desk, people will often write them a note asking to talk on a sticky note and put it on their desk. Our “how to improve our workplace” suggestion sheets always come on physical paper, etc. Basically it behooves you to be able to write basic kanji and express yourself. If you can’t, it could lead people do doubt your Japanese abilities, and unfortunately doubt your ability to do your job by extention

13. Biggest reason I’ve ever had for writing kanji is it helped me memorize them more quickly and develop a sense of “kanji fluency” or whatever where I can learn new kanji more quickly cuz I recognize radicals or can easily write a new kanji with good stroke order now that I have a general familiarity with the process. Not ever gonna be practically important beyond helping with those things in my opinion, but lol I’ve not lived in Japan just spent a bit over a month there.

14. I agree with everyone’s “it depends” answer

    For me, I’ve forgotten how to write the majority of kanji over the years, despite being able to read/type them well enough. When I have to handwrite notes on a sticky note for a coworker (I work in a Japanese office), I just write it out in hiragana or look up the kanji I need and copy it quick. I think you should learn to write your basics (address, etc.) while living in Japan, but it’s generally okay if you can’t write a ton of kanji.

    I’m not really pressed about it, though at some point I guess I’ll try and relearn writing kanji for the fun of it. There’s a test called the Kanji Kentei that native Japanese users take, and I know tons of foreigners who enjoy writing kanji, so they opt to take the tests along with the elementary school kids, just for a hobby though.

15. Not that important for everyday life. Obviously reading is way more important than writing.

    Personally, I enjoyed the handwriting practice which is why I kept it up until I could write almost as cleanly as a native. But definitely not a necessary skill.

16. imo if you can write it, you are more likely to distinguish between similar looking kanji because you have internalized how they are different.

    If you need to read kanji, then knowing how to write it is implicitly helpful

17. It’s not exactly *necessary,* but it’s very useful and you’ll use it! If anything, you’ll want to be able to write your address in kanji. It makes the process of filling out forms that much quicker.

18. I’m not going to weigh in with any super-prescriptive answer, but in my own experience, learning to write the characters helps _immeasurably_ with being able to read them, and in retaining that knowledge over the long-term.

19. More than you think depending on what you do. In corporate jobs running a workshop or similar using post it notes it’s good to have solid basics at least since you need to be quick on your feet and write legibly.

    Generally the amount of paper forms and handwriting will likely be a big culture shock compared to more digitised countries.

    How many and what kanjis you need depends on your job, level and function. Addresses and names around you, most definitely. You will write your address an infinite number of times on multiple copies of the same document.

    Kana and first 500 kanji would probably be a good start and help your reading too.

20. I’m not in a position to say what is actually expected or required for expats, but personally, I think I would die of shame if I lived abroad and could speak the local language but couldn’t at least handwrite a nice thank you note, a shopping list, or a note to the delivery man to please bring the package to the back door.

21. Learning is all input. Easiest way to read is to become comfortable writing, and the quicker you can recall kanji on the fly, the more comfortable you will be with writing.

22. Writing helps in learning, but I’d say only prioritize it if you plan on living here and don’t wanna look illiterate. But I’d recommend learning kanji through words, not as individual characters. I tried that at first, and the contextlessness of it was rough. But studying kanji via vocabulary chunks stuck a looooot better.

23. My case is unrelated to your situation, but in my experience as a student, a lot of scholarship foundations require handwritten forms, motivation essays, etc. If anyone is going to Japan to study, it might be worth your while to at least make your Japanese handwriting neat.

24. I’ve not lived here very long but in the past six months the only kanji I’ve needed to write from memory is my address. I will say knowing how to write them makes it easier to remember them for me, which makes it easier to read. I’m sure there are some jobs where it’s useful/necessary though

25. Learning how to write helps improving and speeding up reading comprehension. Period.

26. Reading generally is all you need.

27. learning to write them helps you learn them because sometimes the differences between two characters are very clear when you know the radicals but not clear if you just try to memorize them without knowing how to write it.
    https://nihonshock.com/2009/09/20-similar-looking-kanji/

28. Honestly? No. As long as you know the important kanji for you like important addresses, you will be absolutely fine.

29. Lots of people get away with being unable to write because they are foreigners.

    Once people graduate from college they spend significantly less time hand writing anything, irregardless of their native language.

    You still get handwritten notes and letters.

30. Not really answering your question, but related to WaniKank. While WK helps you know the English equivalent when reading japanese, it doesn’t train the other way around. However someone made a cool tool for that:

    KaniWani. The website connects to your WK Account and does basically the same as WK, but in reverse. I.e. it tells you the English word(s), and you must put in the japanese.

    Additionally, if you have a graphic tablet and are using windows (might also work with other OSs), you can use the handwritten input function to actually write the answer in Kana/Kanji. Iirc it’s not supported by all browsers, though

31. I’ve seen a video of a guy I watch (I wanna say it’s Yuta) who went out and asked people in his area to write kanji for him. Most the people didn’t know the stroke order for the kanji they were asked to write, especially since typing and texting is so common.

    So even Japan born native speakers don’t even know the stroke order and it’s becoming less needed to know them with modern tech.

    It is useful to know the order, but it’s not a harsh requirement in modern times.

32. I don’t think so but in my opinion it makes it easier to remember them. It’s like this thing of “you think you know what a bicycle looks like until you have to draw one”

33. I don’t know about Japan and Kanji and this might not be what you mean but I am not even sure being able to hand write in English is a needed skill in everyday life anymore, just as long as you can type it you can probably get by in most scenarios.

34. That depends on what your “everyday” looks like.

    If you’re a single foreigner here who’s intent on a short stint and then leaving, then you can certainly get by without kanji.

    If you end up getting married and do the whole family thing? It’s pretty useful, but not *necessary*.

    Regardless, if you bust out some hand written kanji, people might be more comfortable around you, as it shows you’re making genuine effort to be part of society.

35. I was just watching a [video](https://youtu.be/exkXaVYvb68) about that question the other day.

36. Besides my address, and medical conditions I haven’t had to write anything else really.

37. You’ll be fine if you can fill out things like administrative paperwork and patient form. So, you’d want to be able to write your name, address, what hurts since when and so on. If you’re a parent you’d be writing what worries you about your child and other things that are relevant to your family as well.

38. I think it’s a good idea but not necessary. I live in Japan. Most of the time I need to write something down is for the doctors office I’ve visited the first time or going to city hall and it’s usually just my address. Besides learning the kanji to be able to write . It’s a good way to distinguish other kanjis from one another. Keep in mind my only jobs have been English teaching but if you wanted to make a career change it could prove useful elsewhere.

39. You need Kanji for:
    Address
    you kids names (if they have kanji)
    basic kanji for (husband/wife/kid)
    and that is pretty much it.

40. As long as you’re enjoying it, just keep with it. I think it’s a fun way to study vocabulary.

41. It will definitely vary depending on your work and where you live. If you’re working with your hands in a big city? Probably not going to be writing something every day. Desk job in the sticks? You betcha.

    I worked a government desk job over there for a couple years. There was a lottt of answering phones and taking notes on the fly, either for yourself or as a message for co-workers.

    You could take the notes in romaji or your native tongue of course, but in my experience being able to scratch out a couple kanji real quick rather than switching your brain into romaji / native tongue mode to write a note while carrying the conversation on the phone was a lot less taxing.

    Other than that there were not many other situations where I’d be required to write something unique. There’s a lot of writing your address, workplace, job title, bank details etc. Not much else in my experience.

42. Veiled behind that question is a different question about what is useful for beginners, they usually ask this question because they want to skip learning how to write entirely. I think learning to write the first 200-300 kanji is helpful for stroke order purposes, after that you really shouldn’t try to memorize them from memory unless you really want to. Eventually you’ll forget how to write them because muscle memory fades quickly. Stroke order on the other hand is something you can memorize and will generally never forget. After you have stroke order down then writing kanji becomes an advanced skill.

    I think a mistake is thinking it’s supposed to be the same as writing an alphabet of only 26 characters where you memorize them and you are done but that isn’t how it works at all. Kanji is practically a separate language, its used for more than just writing everyday text. But as a learner you are mostly just concerned with stroke order and vocabulary.

43. Why are you learning kanji a few days in.

    Learn hiragana and katakana first.