Every week we take one confusing corner of Japanese grammar and settle it. Usually that means a set of forms that look almost identical and are not: which one to reach for, why the other three are wrong, and what happens if you pick the wrong one anyway.

This page is the full list. Bookmark it, and check back on Mondays.

Deep Dives

Full lessons, right here on the page, with audio on every example sentence and a printable reference sheet to download.

• Five Ways to Say “It Seems”: そう・よう・みたい・らしい・っぽい
  They all come out as “it seems” in English, and each one makes a different claim about how you know. Your eyes, your head, somebody else’s mouth, or a shrug — plus the one い that flips a sentence into its opposite.
• The Four Ways to Say “If”: と・ば・たら・なら
  English has one word for all four. Japanese does not. Which one to use, what rules each of them out, and the two-second test that keeps you out of most of the trouble.
• Four Similar Grammar Patterns: ～ようになる・～ようにする・～ことになる・～ことにする
  Two axes crossed. よう or こと decides whether you are talking about change or about a decision. なる or する decides whether it happened to you or you made it happen.
• Exploring Japanese Compound Verbs
  What happens when two verbs fuse into one, and why the result usually means more than the sum of its parts.

Quick Comparisons

Shorter pieces on a single pair or a small set, each with a printable PDF and sound files.

• What’s the Difference? 未満みまん and 以下いか
  Both come out as “under” or “less than” in English. They differ on one point: whether the number itself is included.
• Give and Receive: あげる・くれる・もらう
  Japanese tracks which direction a favor is traveling, in and out of your own circle. English does not, which is why this one takes practice.
• And in Japanese
  Several ways to join two things, and they are not interchangeable. Which one you choose says whether your list is complete.

More Lessons with Bonus Downloads

Printable lessons and sound files on other grammar points that trip people up.

• What Is the Difference Between たら and なら — the pair our deep dive on the four conditionals expands into four.
• Understanding が
• Degrees of Certainty — the adverbs (絶対ぜったい, きっと, 多分たぶん), not the endings above.
• とか and が
• While… in Japanese
• Passive Form
• Using になる・になります

What’s Coming

The next few weeks, so you know what to look out for:

• に and で, the two particles beginners get wrong most often
• ている・てある・ておく・てしまう, what the て-form is really doing
• は and が, the definitive version
• つもり・予定よてい・はず・べき, intention against expectation