N5 · UNIT 6

Adjectives I

Your first adjectives. Describe things, places, and experiences, new and old, cheap and expensive, with い- and な-adjectives, their past forms, and the degree words とても and あまり.

About this unit

Adjectives, both tribes: い and な. Learn how they attach, how they form their past tense (and why でした is the classic trap), and how とても and あまり turn the volume up and down. After this unit nothing is just a thing, it's new, old, cheap, delicious, or not very interesting.

語彙 · Vocabulary 44 words · 10 kanji

1

Read the words

Read straight down the list once, out loud if you can. Don't grind them here, the Anki deck at the bottom does the memorizing. Right now you only want the shapes and sounds to feel familiar.

WordReadingMeaning
big; large
small; little
new
old (things, not people)
good
bad
hot (weather)
cold (weather)
cold (to the touch)
delicious; tasty
interesting; funny
difficult
easy; kind
cheap; inexpensive
fun; enjoyable
busy
white
black
red
blue
long
short
fast; early
slow; late
many; much
few; little
wide; spacious
narrow; cramped
near; close
far
pretty; clean
quiet
lively; bustling
famous
kind; helpful
healthy; energetic; fine
free (not busy)
convenient
very
not very (with negative)
what kind of
town; city
place
café
2

Learn the kanji

The 10 kanji for this unit. Tap any card to flip between its meaning and its readings, and say the reading aloud as it flips.

high; expensive
cheap; peaceful
new
old
white
black
red
blue
many
few; a little
3

Read it in context

Everything above, working together. Read the conversation top to bottom, out loud. Every line is built only from words and kanji you have already met, so resist the English, tap a word only if you are truly stuck.

Show English

Maria and Mr. Tanaka check out the brand-new café in front of the station, and end up missing an old favorite.

マリア
Mr. Tanaka, there's a new café in front of the station. Shall we go?
たなか
Sounds good. Let's go.
マリア
Wow, what a pretty shop. It's really lively.
たなか
It is. But it's crowded, isn't it. The coffee is 450 yen? That's a bit expensive.
マリア
You're right, it's not cheap. Is it good?
たなか
Hmm... I had cake here yesterday. It wasn't very good.
マリア
Oh, really?
たなか
There's an old kissaten behind the station. The coffee there is excellent. And it's 300 yen.
マリア
Nice! What kind of place is it?
たなか
It's a small shop. Very quiet.
マリア
Let's go there tomorrow!
Notice: きれいなみせ needs な, but 新しいカフェ connects bare, the final い of an い-adjective does the work by itself. And when Tanaka said あまり, a negative was already guaranteed: あまりおいしくなかったです.
Stop, learn the vocabulary before the grammar

These units are short on purpose. The grammar only clicks when the words are already automatic, so front-load the deck here, and let spaced repetition do the memorizing while the lesson does the teaching.

  1. Import this unit's deck. Generate it with npm run content:deck, then import n5-unit6-deck.apkg into Anki or Migaku. (SRS connection status lives on your dashboard.)
  2. Learn all 44 words as new cards. Get through the whole deck in a sitting or two, you're aiming for recognition, not mastery yet.
  3. Review daily until every card reaches a 3–5 day interval. When the whole deck has settled at that spacing, the words are holding on their own and won't fight you during the grammar.
  4. Then come back. You'll read the patterns instead of decoding the words, and that's when a "small" unit actually soaks in.
Anki open with AnkiConnect? I can confirm the deck for you.

Tick the box above once the deck is soaking in, then the grammar unlocks.

文法 · Grammar 4 patterns

Take one pattern at a time. Read the rule, then read each example out loud until the shape feels obvious. The words should already be automatic from your deck, so all you are learning here is how they lock together.

Quick suggestion: write these patterns down by hand as you read them. It is the one habit that textbook learners and self-taught immersion learners both swear by, and a notebook is the cheapest memory upgrade there is. Not required, just recommended.
い-adjectives end in い and conjugate themselves: drop the い, add くない for the negative. です only adds politeness, it never changes.
This café is new.
That coffee isn't expensive.
Note: One rebel: いい (good) borrows the old form よ, for everything except the plain present. いくないです ✗, よくないです ✓.
な-adjectives behave like nouns: です for is, じゃないです for isn't. The な itself appears ONLY when the adjective sits directly before a noun.
This library is quiet.
What a pretty town.
Note: Before a noun: きれいなまち (な required), but 高い本 (no な, い-adjectives connect bare). Beware: きれい and ゆうめい end in い but are な-adjectives, the two most famous traps in N5.
Past tense: い-adjectives swap い for かった (negative: くなかった). な-adjectives simply take でした (negative: じゃなかったです).
Yesterday's test was difficult.
The cake wasn't very good.
I was free every Saturday.
Note: むずかしいでした ✗, かった already IS the past; でした belongs to な-adjectives and nouns only. And いい stays rebellious: よかったです／よくなかったです.
Degree words: とても (very) boosts affirmatives, あまり (not very) pairs ONLY with negatives, and どんな＋noun asks “what kind of?”
This coffee is very good.
That movie isn't very interesting.
What kind of town is it?
Note: あまりおいしいです ✗, あまり without a negative is like saying “not very” without the “not.” Hear あまり, expect ～ない.

文化 · Culture note

A short read on the world these words live in. Nothing to drill here, just the context that makes the grammar feel like something people actually say.

Kissaten Time

Japan runs two parallel café universes. The modern chains, Starbucks, Doutor, Komeda, are bright, fast, and predictable. The きっさてん is their opposite: a Shōwa-era coffee house with dark wood, worn velvet chairs, jazz on vinyl, and a master who has hand-poured the same house blend for forty years. Many haven't been redecorated since the 1970s, and that is exactly the appeal.

Both universes share one glorious rule: a single coffee buys the seat for as long as you like. Students camp for hours with textbooks, novelists fill notebooks, office workers doze. Nobody hovers with the bill. The coffee may cost ¥500, but you're not really paying for the drink, you're renting a quiet corner of the city.

In Nagoya, morning coffee comes with a bonus. Order any drink before 11 a.m. and the モーニング set appears: thick-cut toast, a boiled egg, sometimes salad, free, or nearly so. Decades of competition between kissaten turned breakfast into a loss leader, and locals plan their whole morning around it.

Try it: Kissaten ordering is one word: ホット、ください gets you a hot house-blend coffee. Then sit back and practice this unit in your head, 古いですか。しずかですか。コーヒーは高いですか。

練習 · Worksheet 8 exercises

Type each missing word in hiragana, then check your answers.

Check your answers to continue, it doesn't matter how many you miss.

Unit Quiz JLPT FORMAT

Pass mark 80% · instant explanations · passing unlocks the next unit