Japanese punctuation


Japanese punctuation includes various written marks, which differ from those found in European languages, as well as some not used in formal Japanese writing but frequently found in more casual writing, such as exclamation and question marks.
Japanese can be written horizontally or vertically, and some punctuation marks adapt to this change in direction. Parentheses, curved brackets, square quotation marks, ellipses, dashes, and swung dashes are rotated clockwise 90° when used in vertical text.
Japanese punctuation marks are usually full width.
Punctuation was not widely used in Japanese writing until translations from European languages became common in the 19th century.

Japanese punctuation marks

Brackets

Various types of brackets are used in Japanese. As in English, brackets are used in pairs to set apart or interject text within other text. When writing vertically, brackets are rotated clockwise ninety degrees. Each bracket occupies its own square when using genkō yōshi.

Braces

Parentheses

Square brackets

Lenticular brackets

, also known as lenticular brackets. Lenticular brackets are also used as quotation marks in the Japanese language.

Comma

SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
、U+30011-1-2、

The comma is used in many contexts, principally for marking off separate elements within a sentence. In horizontal writing, the comma is placed at the bottom right of the preceding character. In vertical writing, it is placed immediately below and to the right of the last character, in a separate square if using genkō yōshi. In horizontally written manuscripts that contain a mixture of Japanese and Western characters, the full-width comma may be incorporated as well. No extra space is left after a comma.
SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
，U+FF0C1-1-4，

Ellipsis

SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
…U+20261-3-63…
‥U+20251-3-63‥

Ellipses, 点線 tensen, or てんてん ten-ten indicate an intentional omission or abbreviation, or a pause in speech, an unfinished thought or, at the end of a sentence, a trailing off into silence. Ellipsis was adopted into Japanese from European languages.
The ellipsis is often three dots or six dots, though variations in number of dots exist. The dots can be either on the baseline or centred between the baseline and the ascender when horizontal; the dots are centred horizontally when vertical.
Other uses:
SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
。U+30021-1-3。

The full stop is a small circle. In horizontal writing, the full stop is placed in the same position as it would be in English, that is, at the bottom right of the preceding character. In vertical writing, it is placed immediately below and to the right of the last character, in a separate square if using genkō yōshi.
Unlike the Western full stop, it is often used to separate consecutive sentences, rather than to finish every sentence; it is frequently left out where a sentence stands alone, or where text is terminated by a quotation mark instead. No extra space is left after a full stop.
In manuscripts that contain a mixture of Japanese and Western characters, the Western full stop may be incorporated as well.

Words containing full stops

Starting in the 1980s, advertising copy writers began incorporating full stops in titles and other advertising. In the 1990s, the group Morning Musume began using a full stop in its name, starting a fad for this usage. Other examples include the following:
The interpunct ・ or "katakana middle dot" is a small dot used for interword separation. It is also known as nakapochi, nakapotsu and nakaten. It has a fixed width that is the same as most kana characters.
Uses include:
SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
〽U+303D1-3-28〽

The part alternation mark 〽 is used to indicate the beginning of a song, or the beginning of the next player's part.
It was most common in Noh chanting books and Renga. In Noh books it is used to mark the beginning of each character's parts. The opening square quotation mark may also be used.

Quotation marks

Single quotation marks

Double quotation marks

Double quotation marks are used to mark quotes within quotes: as well as to mark book titles. They are also used sometimes, in fiction, to denote text that is heard through a telephone or other device.

Space

SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
U+30001-1-1　


1. 3 spaces before the title.
2. 1 space between the author's family name and given name; 1 space below.
3. Each new paragraph begins after a space.
4. Subheadings have 1 empty line before and after, and have 2 spaces above.
5'. Punctuation marks normally occupy their own square, except when they occur at the bottom of a line, in which case they share a square with the last character of the line.
A space is any empty zone between written sections. In Japanese, the space is referred to by the transliterated English name. A Japanese space is the same width as a CJK character and is thus also called an "ideographic space".
In English, spaces are used for interword separation as well as separation between punctuation and words. In normal Japanese writing, no spaces are left between words, except if the writing is exclusively in hiragana or katakana, in which case spaces may be required to avoid confusion.
In Japanese, a single space is often left before the first character in a new paragraph, especially when writing on genkō yōshi, and a space is left after non-Japanese punctuation marks. A space may be left between the family and given names as well. When the character is not easily available, a direct HTML equivalent is the   entity which outputs the same fullwidth " " glyph.
A fullwidth space may be used where a colon or comma would be used in English: .

Wave dash

SymbolUnicodeJIS X 0213Encoding
〜U+301C1-1-33〜

The wave dash ' resembles a lengthened tilde, which does not exist in JIS X 0208.
Uses in Japanese include:
The Japanese versions of these punctuation marks are usually full-width characters. A full-width space is usually left after such marks when writing in Japanese.

Colon

The colon consists of two equally sized dots centered on the same vertical line. As a rule, a colon informs the reader that what follows proves, clarifies, explains, or simply enumerates elements of what is referred to before. Although not a native Japanese punctuation mark, the colon is sometimes used, especially in academic writing.
As in English, the colon is commonly used in Japanese to indicate time or for lists.

Exclamation mark

The exclamation point or mark is usually used after an interjection or exclamation to indicate strong feelings or high volume, and generally marks the end of a sentence. A sentence ending in an exclamation mark is either an actual exclamation, a command, or is intended to be astonishing in some way.
While there is no exclamation point in formal Japanese, it is very commonly used, especially in casual writing, fiction and manga.

Question mark

In formal Japanese, no particular symbol is used to mark interrogative sentences, which end with the normal Japanese full stop. However, the question mark is very commonly used, especially in casual and creative writing and in manga. It is generally known formally as 疑問符 or less formally はてなマーク, but the katakana form of "question mark" is also common.

Musical note

This sign is added to the tail of a phrase, indicating it is a part of lyrics or someone is singing the phrase.