Basic Japanese Stroke Order Rules
Stroke order is the sequence in which the strokes of a character are written. It is taught for both kana and kanji because it is commonly said to make characters faster to write and more consistent-looking when handwritten. The rules below are commonly taught in Japanese schools, though characters can have exceptions.
Common rules
- Top to bottom. Strokes near the top are usually written before strokes below them.
- Left to right. Strokes on the left are usually written before strokes to their right.
- Horizontal before vertical where two strokes cross, though this varies by character.
- Outside before inside for enclosing shapes, with the enclosure usually closed last.
- A character is usually written in one continuous, planned sequence rather than lifting the pen at random points.
Exceptions worth knowing
Not every character follows every rule strictly, and some fonts display strokes joined or separated differently from how they are handwritten. For example, き and り are commonly handwritten with their last two strokes separate, while some fonts show them as one connected stroke. The diagrams on this site follow the commonly taught handwritten form — see the note on the about page.
See it in motion
Every character on the hiragana and katakana pages has an animated, numbered stroke order diagram with direction arrows, plus a step-by-step build-up. Afterwards you can test yourself or print a tracing sheet.