Difference between とし and まち

Hi,

does someone know the difference between とし and まち ? both of them mean “city” or “town”, but it’s not clear to me when to use one or the other.

Thanks!!

4 comments
  1. まち(町) means town (a small one, not really urban)

    とし(都市)means a large urban city

  2. 村 – under 8000 residents

    町 – 8000-50000 residents

    市 – over 50000 residents

  3. 町 is what I’d roughly translate as *town*, 街 is *city*, 都市 is also *city* but if context says so it can be *metropolis* or *[insert favorite type of city]-polis*.

    Or you can hit monolingual or even Japanese Wikipedia for this one, if that’s an option for you.

  4. Hmm. I think I’d use とし、まち as general terms, but for specific US cities and towns I’d probably just say シティ and タウン。I’m honestly not sure what I’d do with less common titles like “parish” or “hamlet” though.

    The difference in Japan is that a とし is large enough that its local government doesn’t use “county/district”-level services (ぐん) so that’s one way to think of it. But they’re a lot bigger than many “cities” around here.

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