In modern Japanese, kanji are used to write parts of the language (usually content words) such

as nouns, adjective stems, and verb stems, while hiragana are used to write inflected verb and adjective endings
and as phonetic complements to disambiguate readings (okurigana), particles, and miscellaneous words which
have no kanji or whose kanji is considered obscure or too difficult to read or remember. Katakana are mostly used
for representing onomatopoeia, non-Japanese loanwords(except those borrowed from ancient Chinese), the
names of plants and animals (with exceptions), and for emphasis on certain words.

Orthographic reform and lists of kanji[edit]

Main article: Japanese script reform

A young woman practicing kanji. Ukiyo-e woodblock print by Yōshū Chikanobu, 1897

In 1946, after World War II and under the Allied Occupation of Japan, the Japanese government, guided by
the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers, instituted a series of orthographic reforms, to help children learn
and to simplify kanji use in literature and periodicals. The number of characters in circulation was reduced, and
formal lists of characters to be learned during each grade of school were established. Some characters were given
simplified glyphs, called shinjitai (新字体). Many variant forms of characters and obscure alternatives for common
characters were officially discouraged.
These are simply guidelines, so many characters outside these standards are still widely known and commonly
used; these are known as hyōgaiji (表外字).

Kyōiku kanji[edit]
Main article: Kyōiku kanji
The kyōiku kanji (教育漢字, lit. "education kanji") are 1,006 characters that Japanese children learn in elementary
school. Originally the list only contained 881 characters. This was expanded to 996 characters in 1977. It was not
until 1982 the list was expanded to its current size. The grade-level breakdown of these kanji is known as
the gakunen-betsu kanji haitōhyō (学年別漢字配当表), or the gakushū kanji. (ja:学年別漢字配当表)

Jōyō kanji[edit]
Main article: Jōyō kanji
The jōyō kanji (常用漢字, regular-use kanji) are 2,136 characters consisting of all the Kyōiku kanji, plus 1,130
additional kanji taught in junior high and high school. [9] In publishing, characters outside this category are often
given furigana. The jōyō kanjiwere introduced in 1981, replacing an older list of 1,850 characters known as
the tōyō kanji (当用漢字, general-use kanji), introduced in 1946. Originally numbering 1,945 characters, the jōyō
kanji list was extended to 2,136 in 2010. Some of the new characters were previously Jinmeiyō kanji; some are
used to write prefecture names: 阪, 熊, 奈, 岡, 鹿, 梨, 阜, 埼, 茨, 栃 and 媛.

Jinmeiyō kanji[edit]
Main article: Jinmeiyō kanji
Since September 27, 2004, the jinmeiyō kanji (人名用漢字, kanji for use in personal names) consist of 3,119
characters, containing the jōyō kanji plus an additional 983 kanji found in people's names. There were only 92 kanji
in the original list published in 1952, but new additions have been made frequently. Sometimes the term jinmeiyō
kanji refers to all 3,119, and sometimes it only refers to the 983 that are only used for names.

Hyōgai kanji[edit]
Main article: Hyōgai kanji
Hyōgai kanji (表外漢字, "unlisted characters") are any kanji not contained in the jōyō kanji and jinmeiyō kanji lists.
These are generally written using traditional characters, but extended shinjitai forms exist.

Japanese Industrial Standards for kanji[edit]

The Japanese Industrial Standards for kanji and kana define character code-points for each kanji and kana, as well
as other forms of writing such as the Latin alphabet, Cyrillic script, Greek alphabet, Hindu-Arabic numerals, etc. for
use in information processing. They have had numerous revisions. The current standards are:

 JIS X 0208,[10] the most recent version of the main standard. It has 6,355 kanji.
 JIS X 0212,[11] a supplementary standard containing a further 5,801 kanji. This standard is rarely used, mainly
because the common Shift JIS encoding system could not use it. This standard is effectively obsolete;
 JIS X 0213,[12] a further revision which extended the JIS X 0208 set with 3,695 additional kanji, of which 2,743
(all but 952) were in JIS X 0212. The standard is in part designed to be compatible with Shift JIS encoding;
 JIS X 0221:1995, the Japanese version of the ISO 10646/Unicode standard.
Gaiji[edit]

Gaiji (外字, literally "external characters") are kanji that are not represented in existing Japanese encoding systems.
These include variant forms of common kanji that need to be represented alongside the more conventional glyph in
reference works, and can include non-kanji symbols as well.
Gaiji can be either user-defined characters or system-specific characters. Both are a problem for information
interchange, as the code point used to represent an external character will not be consistent from one computer or
operating system to another.