hanamaru
What is a particle?
A particle is a small word after another word that says what role the word plays in the sentence — who does, what is done, whose.
The small words that mark roles in a sentence
Example Sentences
Cats love fish
Word order: the verb always comes last
In Japanese, the verb is always placed at the end of the sentence. Preceding phrases can shift position freely because each noun is bound to a particle that determines its grammatical role.
Particles govern roles, not position. The particles は and を define the actor and the recipient of the action. Use the swap button above to see how preceding elements shift without altering the sentence structure.
English shows the roles of words by their order: “Yuki eats fish” and “fish eats Yuki” mean different things. Japanese does it with small words placed after the word — particles. わたしは: this is what I am talking about. さかなを: this is what something is done to. ゆきの: this belongs to Yuki. The particle always sits right after the word it belongs to, and it never changes shape.
That is why the words in a Japanese sentence can swap places without the meaning changing: the particle travels with its word. And why a particle never stands alone — it belongs to the word before it. After a word comes one particle, not two: も takes は's place, it does not sit next to it.
The particles you meet first: は marks the topic, が points out who or what, を what the action lands on, の the owner, も “also”, か turns the sentence into a question. Each has an article of its own. Read them as they come up — you do not need all of them at once.
The starter particles at a glance
Tips and Common Traps
Build the Sentence
JLPT N5Drink water
Arrange the words in the correct Japanese order: