Two syllabaries, one sound system
Japanese has two kana scripts with the same set of sounds. Hiragana (ひらがな) is used for native words and grammar; katakana (カタカナ) for loanwords, foreign names, emphasis and onomatopoeia. Learners convert between them to practise reading, and developers need conversion for search and sorting (a search for コーヒー should find こーひー in some systems).
Because the two blocks are laid out in parallel in Unicode, each hiragana character has an exact katakana counterpart. The converter maps:
- all basic and voiced kana (が, ぱ…);
- small kana (ゃ, っ, ぁ…);
- the iteration marks ゝ ゞ ↔ ヽ ヾ.
Kanji, the long-vowel mark ー, romaji, numbers and punctuation are unchanged. Katakana that has no hiragana equivalent in everyday use (like ヴ) is converted to its Unicode counterpart (ゔ).
For half-width katakana (ｶﾀｶﾅ), first convert with the Full-width / Half-width Converter.
Worked example
Here is what the Hiragana ↔ Katakana Converter returns for its built-in example. Settings used: Convert to: Katakana. Click Try an example in the tool above to load it, then change it as you like.
わたしは にほんごを べんきょうしています。きょうは いい てんきですね。ワタシハ ニホンゴヲ ベンキョウシテイマス。キョウハ イイ テンキデスネ。Questions
How do I convert hiragana to katakana?
Paste the text with “Katakana” selected; every hiragana character is converted, and kanji are left as they are.
Does it convert kanji?
No. Kanji readings depend on context and need a dictionary; only kana are converted.
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