Days, Months and Years in Japanese

Do you know how to write and say the days, months and years in Japanese? In this article, we will take a detailed look at how to write and pronounce days, months, and years in the Japanese language. Remembering that the writing is usually similar to the Chinese language, which can make it easier for you to recognize both.

Days, months, and years can be written with both Roman numerals (123) and with the ideograms of the Japanese language (一二三). There is no rule for when to use each of these forms, they usually coexist in different occasions. Of course, when pronouncing, it is recommended to use the popular reading in the Japanese language.

We also recommend reading:

How do you say the days of the week in Japanese?

Although the focus of this article is the days, months and years, we should start by looking at the days of the week in Japanese (Monday to Sunday), which are practically the names of the planets or the 5 elements.

domingo日曜日nichiyoubi
segunda-feira月曜日getsuyoubi
terça-feira火曜日kayoubi
quarta-feira水曜日suiyoubi
quinta-feira木曜日mokuyoubi
sexta-feira金曜日kinyoubi
sábado土曜日doyoubi

How do you say the days of the month in Japanese?

The days of the month are accompanied by an ideogram that is pronounced nichi [日] which means sun and day. The table below explains better the ways to pronounce the days of the month in Japanese.

We leave below 2 readings, both are correct but are used differently. When referring to a day in a given month, we usually use the special reading in bold.

DAYROMAJIKANJISPECIAL ROMAJI
1ichi nichi一日 tsuitachi
2ni nichi二日 futsuka
3san nichi三 日 mikka
4shi/yon nichi四日 yokka
5go nichi 五日 itsuka
6roku nichi 六日 muika
7nana nichi七 日 nanoka
8hachi nichi八 日 youka
9kyu nichi九 日 kokonoka
10juu nichi 十日 tooka
11juu ichi nichi 十一日
12juu ni nichi 十二日
13juu san nichi 十三日
14juu yon nichi 十四日 juu yokka
15...juu go nichi 十五日
20nii ju nichi二 十日 hatsu ka
24nii ju yon nichi 二十四日 ni juu yokka
25nii ju go nichi 二十五日
30san juu nichi 三十日
31san juu ichi nichi 三十一日
Days, months and years in Japanese

How do you say the months in Japanese?

In Japanese, there is no special name for each month. They usually just say the number followed by the ideogram tsuki (月) which means moon (tsuki) and month (gatsu). It may seem strange to say Month 1, Month 2, Month 3, but when you stop to think about it, it is much simpler and easier.

PortugueseJapaneseRomaji
January一月ichigatsu
February二月nigatsu
March三月sangatsu
April四月shigatsu
May五月gogatsu
June六月rokugatsu
July七月shichigatsu
August八月hachigatsu
September九月kugatsu
October十月juugatsu
November十一月juuichigatsu
December十二月juunigatsu

The Japanese also have an old traditional way of saying the months in Japanese that is rarely used. Currently it is often used in horoscope calendars, lunar calendar and other traditional things.

This calendar is called the wafuu getsumii [和風月名] which literally means Japanese-style month names.

PortugueseKanjiRomaji
January睦月mutsuki
February如月kisaragi
March弥生yayoi
April卯月udzuki
May皐月satsuki
June水無月minadzuki
July文月fumidzuki
August葉月hadzuki
September長月nagatsuki
October神無月kannadzuki
November霜月shimotsuki
December師走shiwasu

Note that not all months in this traditional list have the moon character.

Days, months and years in Japanese

The article is still halfway through, but we recommend also reading:

How do you say the year in Japanese?

The year works in the same way as the day and month, the number accompanied by the ideogram "nen" [年] which literally means year. See an example below:

  • 2005 年 4 月 1日 – April 1, 2005 / Nii sen go nen / shigatsu / tsuitachi 二千五年 四月 一日

We realize that first comes the year, then the month and finally the day. If we know all the numbers in the Japanese language we can easily write the days, months and years in the language.

Read also: Numbers in Japanese - Complete Guide

Calendário - カレンダー (karendaa)

We can't talk about years, days, months and dates without talking about calendars and other related words like Japanese leap year, lunar calendar and other date related words. Make good use of the vocabulary table below:

カレンダーkarendaaCalendar
KoyomiCalendar
太陽暦TayourekiSolar Calendar
太陰暦TaiinrekiLunar Calendar
平年Heinencommon year
閏年juunenLeap year
西暦SeirekiIt was common

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