Meaning & readings

candy, cakes, fruit

On’yomi

Origin

This character combines a grass radical at the top with the character (fruit) at the bottom, which serves as a sound hint for pronunciation. The grass radical classifies the character as relating to plants, while suggests how to say it. Over time, the meaning shifted from just "fruit" to include processed plant-based foods like candy and cakes—sweet treats made from plant materials. The combination essentially marks this as a plant-based food category.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).

11 strokes

Components

  • radical top
  • sound hint bottom

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 菓子 かし confectionery; sweets
  • お菓子 おかし confections; sweets
  • 菓子屋 かしや confectionery shop; candy store
  • 駄菓子 だがし penny candy; cheap individually wrapped sweets
  • 和菓子 わがし wagashi; traditional Japanese confectionery
  • 駄菓子屋 だがしや small-time candy store; penny candy store
  • お菓子屋 おかしや confectionery shop; candy store

Reference

Strokes
11
Kangxi radical
140
Grade
Jōyō (secondary school)
Frequency rank
#1719 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 2
Unicode
U+083D3