Masu form of Japanese verbs

Meet the masu form of Japanese verbs!

If in the previous article we discovered a informal mode of japanese verbs, in today's article, we'll get to know the formal mode, which in Japanese is called the masu form.

Masu form of Japanese verbs

As mentioned in previous articles, the Japanese language, unlike many languages in the world, has degrees of hierarchy. As such, there are words that are used in certain circumstances and not in others. This type of behavior is known as formality levels, and like many words, Japanese verbs are included in this behavior.

Hover your mouse cursor over Japanese symbols to see their pronunciation and translation.

The conjugation of verbs in Japanese

In order to conjugate Japanese verbs in the masu form, it is necessary to know how to divide the verbs into groups and to know well the families of hiragana and katakana. Depending on each verbal group, the rules for conjugating Japanese verbs will be different.

If you don't remember or want to know more about how to divide verbs into groups, I suggest you read the article “Japanese verb groups“.

The formal present tense of Japanese verbs

The formal present tense of Japanese verbs is made by adding the extension ?? in each of the verbs in the Japanese language. But this is not done anyway, it usually varies according to the verbal group.

Group of verbs ending in u

The conjugation of u-ending Japanese verbs will be the trickiest part, as the inflection of the verb changes according to its ending.

The strategy is to remember all hiragana families, modifying all the last syllable of each verb ending with a sound of ?u?, to the syllable of the same family ending with a sound of ?i?, adding the extension ?? after her.

That way, if a verb ends in ?, it will be changed to ? + ??; if it ends in ?, will become ? + ??; if he ends up in ?, will become ? + ?? and so on.

Examples:

?? will come ????
?? will come ????
?? will come ????
?? will come ????
?? will come ????
?? will come ????

Group of verbs ending in iru and eru

This is the easiest group to match. Just change the ru ending to our extension ??. Just look at the examples below:

??? will come ????
?? will come ???
??? will come ????
??? will come ????

Irregular verb group

This group has no conjugation rules. It is better to gradually get used to each one of them.

Examples:

?? will come ???
?? will come ???

The formal past of Japanese verbs

Since we already know how to obtain the form masu in the formal present tense, what we are going to do now is to derive the formal present tense for the other verb tenses in Japanese. In the case of the formal past, everything is easier since it has only one rule.

Just take the verbs in the formal present tense above and change the syllable ?, found at the end of all verbs, by the extension ??. See below the examples separated by groups.

Group of Japanese verbs ending in u

?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????

Group of verbs ending in iru and eru

??? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ??? and then turns ????
??? will come ???? and then turns ?????
??? will come ???? and then turns ?????

Irregular verb group

?? will come ??? and then turns ????
?? will come ??? and then turns ????

The formal negative present tense of Japanese verbs

The negative present tense of Japanese verbs is also performed through a single rule, obtaining the negative past tense of verbs conjugated in the formal present tense. In this case, just take the verbs in the formal present tense and change the syllable ?, found at the end of all verbs, by the extension ??. See below the examples separated by groups.

Group of Japanese verbs ending in u

?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ???? and then turns ?????

Group of verbs ending in iru and eru

??? will come ???? and then turns ?????
?? will come ??? and then turns ????
??? will come ???? and then turns ?????
??? will come ???? and then turns ?????

Irregular verb group

?? will come ??? and then turns ????
?? will come ??? and then turns ????

The formal negative past of Japanese verbs

The formal negative past is the last tense of the form ?? and it follows the same rule as the previous conjugations, always deriving the verbs from the formal present tense.

This time, let's change the syllable ?, found at the end of all verbs conjugated in the formal present tense, by the extension ?????. Below are the examples separated by groups.

Group of Japanese verbs ending in u

?? will come ???? and then turns ????????
?? will come ???? and then turns ????????
?? will come ???? and then ????????
?? will come ???? and then turns ????????
?? will come ???? and then turns ????????
?? will come ???? and then turns ????????

Group of verbs ending in iru and eru

??? will come ???? and then turns ????????
?? will come ??? and then turns ???????
??? will come ???? and then turns ????????
??? will come ???? and then turns ????????

Irregular verb group

?? will come ??? and then turns ???????
?? will come ??? and then turns ???????

How to use Japanese verbs in masu form

As with any verb in the Japanese language, they are usually used at the end of a sentence, following a general formula of subject + object (direct or indirect) + verb. Just remember to put in the proper particles, because without them, sentences are completely meaningless. Right?

Examples:

?????????????
??????????
??????????????
??????????????????

Kanji calligraphy exercise

Below are the Japanese ideographic symbols used in this article. Selecting the desired kanji, copy and paste them into Worksheet for Kana and Kanji Practice , a new window will open where you can see the printable file and practice Japanese calligraphy by covering the gray symbols and then trying to write yourself. Just print and practice.

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