Hiragana and Katakana Quiz Online: Test How Well You Know the Syllabaries
The hiragana and katakana quiz gives you ten characters in a row, each with four romanized reading options. It takes a minute and immediately shows which characters you mix up. At the end you get a list of characters to review. No registration needed, and you can take the quiz as many times as you like: the questions are new each time.
You have learned the syllabaries when a character can be read instantly, without mentally scanning a chart. The easiest way to check this is with random characters mixed together — below is a quiz for each syllabary and a breakdown of what to do with the result.
Hiragana Quiz
Choose the reading of the character. Ten questions, with the correct answer after each.
The quiz covers the 46 basic characters: the vowels, the rows from K to R, and ん. Voiced characters (が, ざ) and small characters (ゃ, っ) are deliberately excluded: they are derived from the basic ones, and ぢ and づ have the same readings as じ and ず, so a question would have two correct answers.
Hiragana Characters Most Often Confused
| Pair | Reading | How They Differ |
|---|---|---|
| ぬ and め | nu and me | ぬ has a loop at the bottom, め does not |
| わ, れ, and ね | wa, re, and ne | わ ends with an arc, れ with a tail pointing outward, ね with a loop |
| る and ろ | ru and ro | る has a loop at the bottom, ろ is open |
| さ and ち | sa and chi | the same shape, mirrored |
| は and ほ | ha and ho | ほ has a second horizontal stroke at the top |
Katakana Quiz
The same quiz for katakana: the 46 basic characters mixed together.
Katakana is usually known less well than hiragana: it is used for loanwords and names, and it appears less often in the first study texts. The main difficulty is the angular characters made of two or three strokes that differ only in slant.
Katakana Pairs People Get Wrong
| Pair | Reading | How to Tell Them Apart |
|---|---|---|
| シ and ツ | shi and tsu | シ has the dots on the left and the stroke going bottom to top, ツ has the dots on top and the stroke going top to bottom |
| ソ and ン | so and n | ソ has both strokes going top to bottom, ン has the lower stroke rising from left to right |
| ウ and ワ | u and wa | ウ has a short stroke on top, ワ does not |
| ク and タ | ku and ta | タ has an extra short stroke inside |
| コ and ユ | ko and yu | ユ has a longer bottom stroke that extends past the vertical |
What to Do with the Quiz Result
- 10 out of 10 — you have learned the syllabary. Take the quiz two or three more times: with random characters, the result should hold.
- 7–9 out of 10 — review the characters from the list after the quiz and write each one by hand five or six times.
- Fewer than 7 — go back to the chart and learn the syllabary in batches of one or two rows, taking the quiz after each batch.
Why Recognizing Is Not Enough — You Have to Write
The quiz tests recognition: the character is in front of you, and the options are given. Writing from memory is harder, and it is writing that fixes the shape for good. So after the quiz it helps to write out the characters you missed in the practice tool — it shows stroke order and scores each stroke.
FAQ
- How do I take the hiragana quiz online?
- Choose a syllabary and answer ten questions: a character appears on screen with four reading options below it. After you answer, you see whether you were right, and at the end you get your score and the characters worth reviewing.
- Why are the answer options in Latin letters rather than Cyrillic?
- The Latin romaji spelling is the same in all textbooks and apps, while Cyrillic renderings vary: し is written both as "si" and as "shi". This way the quiz does not penalize you for the transcription system you learned.
- Can I take the quiz several times?
- Yes, as many times as you like. The characters are chosen anew from the 46 basic ones each time, so a repeat run does not match the previous one, and you cannot simply memorize the result by question order.
- Why is the katakana quiz harder?
- Katakana appears less often than hiragana, and its characters are simpler in shape: two or three straight strokes that differ by slant. The pairs シ and ツ, ソ and ン confuse even those who have been learning the language for more than a month.
- What should I learn after passing the quiz without mistakes?
- Voiced and contracted syllables (が, きゃ), then simple words with the new characters and the first kanji. A syllabary sticks only when you read it constantly, so it is worth moving on to texts right away.
Updated: 2026-09-29