Look-Alike Kana: シ vs ツ, ソ vs ン, ね vs れ vs わ
Almost every beginner stares at シ and ツ wondering which is which. The secret isn’t the final shape. It’s the direction the strokes are written. Once you know that, the hardest kana pairs separate cleanly.
Katakana: シ/ツ and ソ/ン
The famous troublemakers. The trick is the angle and direction of the short strokes: シ and ン are flat and written upward; ツ and ソ are steep and written downward.
シ's two short strokes are flatter and are written upward (from the bottom-left); the long stroke sweeps up. ツ's short strokes are steeper and written downward (from the top); the long stroke sweeps down.
ソ's second (long) stroke is steep, written top-to-bottom. ン's second stroke is flatter, written bottom-to-top, the same up/down logic as シ/ツ.
Hiragana: ね/れ/わ and More
Same left stroke; the right side differs: ね ends in a full loop, わ in an open curve, れ in a simple hook with no loop.
ほ has an extra horizontal stroke across the top-right that は lacks.
る finishes with a small loop at the bottom; ろ ends with no loop.
Why This Matters on the JLPT
Kana confusion rarely shows up as its own question type, but it quietly costs points across the whole exam. Misread シ as ツ in a listening transcript you glance at, or a vocabulary choice printed in small text, and you can pick a wrong answer while feeling completely confident, since the mistake happens before you even start reasoning about meaning.
This is also why speed matters less than accuracy in the early stages of learning kana. Reading quickly on top of a shaky シ/ツ distinction just means making the same misread faster. Fix the stroke-direction habit first, and speed follows naturally once your eye stops hesitating on these pairs.
How to Tell Them Apart
- Learn the stroke order. Direction is the real difference, and writing by hand makes it physical, not just visual.
- Use the up/down rule for katakana: シ/ン go up, ツ/ソ go down.
- Compare the pair side by side, never one at a time, so the contrast is part of the memory.
Teacher's Note
Don't just read kana. Write them. The シ/ツ and ソ/ン confusion disappears almost overnight once you practice the stroke direction by hand, because your hand remembers the motion even when your eye is unsure.
Master kana from day one
Nihongo Pass drills hiragana and katakana with the readings and audio you need, so シ and ツ never trade places again.