Millions of people are learning an Asian language for reasons such as culture, economy, or self-improvement. Among Asian languages, Japanese and Chinese seem to be the most popular. However, which is better to learn? You may ask yourself, “should I learn Chinese or Japanese?”
You may want to learn Chinese if you prefer a simpler writing system and grammar. Japanese may be better for its easier pronunciation and less number of competent English-Japanese speakers. Both languages allow you to appreciate their unique cultures.
In this article, let’s explore if you should learn Japanese or Chinese. We will also explore why you should learn one over the other.
Why Should You Learn Chinese Over Japanese?
Chinese, or Mandarin Chinese, is the official language in China and Taiwan. It also has a massive presence in Singapore and Malaysia. It may be the native language of the Chinese diaspora worldwide.
Chinese is also the world’s second most spoken language, with over 1.1 billion speakers. It only loses out to English with 1.4 billion. These numbers include learners and native speakers.
Japanese is only spoken by about 125 million people worldwide, about 10% of Chinese speakers.
If you are a hardcore numbers guy, it would just make sense that you learn Chinese over Japanese.
Slightly Simpler Grammar
You can look at a language’s grammar to decide if it will be difficult to learn. When it comes to grammar, there are two major principles in play:
- The simpler the grammar, the easier it is for you to learn.
- The more similar the grammar is to your mother tongue, the easier it is for you to learn.
For example, if you are a native speaker of English, you may find the grammar of a language such as German easy.
READ MORE: How To Tell If A Language Is Difficult To Learn
Now let’s consider these two points and dive into Chinese grammar.
English has many characteristics of European languages, especially in grammar.
Many concepts in English grammar can be difficult, such as articles, gender forms, and conjugations. You do not have these concepts in Chinese grammar.
Many concepts in English grammar can be difficult, such as articles, gender forms, and conjugations. You do not have these concepts in Chinese grammar.
Without articles, you do not have to worry about deciding between a, and, or the for any objects or subjects.
Without gender forms, you can forget about having to learn the male and female versions of things. No more figuring out between tiger and tigress, waiter and waitress, or chairman and chairwoman.
Without conjugations, you also do not worry about verb tenses. No more pain of trying to figure out when to use eat, eaten, ate, eating, etc.
The Chinese language performs these functions by either using additional words or indirectly implying that the object is special (without needing to use ‘the‘)
The Chinese language also shares the same word order structure as English. Word order looks at how parts of speech (e.g., nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.) are arranged to form a sentence.
In this case, Chinese and English use the Subject-Verb-Object (SOV) structure.
| English | Chinese |
| Johnny (S) eats (V) an apple (O) | 小强(S) 吃 (V) 苹果(O) Xiao Qiang (S) eats (V) an apple (O) |
This makes the Chinese language’s grammar quite difficult for English speakers to pick up. This is because it is simpler than English, and it has some similarities to English as well.
This may be surprising to many since, on the surface, Chinese is actually seen as one of the most difficult languages in the world to learn.
READ MORE: Hardest Asian Languages To Learn
The Japanese language has a more complex grammar than Chinese. It uses verb conjugations and has an SOV word order. This means Japanese grammar may be slightly harder for English speakers to learn.
Easier Writing System
On the surface, Chinese and Japanese are equally alien to many English speakers. But if you dissect the writing system, you may conclude that Chinese may be easier to learn to write.
Dissect the writing system, and you may conclude that Chinese may be easier to learn to write.
There are several major writing systems for languages. You have alphabetic, with English as one example. Chinese is a prime example of a logographic writing system.
In a logographic writing system, meanings are represented in a logo/symbol. In Chinese, these are called Chinese characters. For example, the word human is written as 人 (rén)
On the surface, Chinese writing may be hard to learn. This is because, in logographic writing, you cannot spell the word, unlike alphabetic. You need to remember the characters pictorially in your head. If you do not remember it, you cannot write it.
However, the Chinese characters were simplified in 1956. You may notice that there are Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese on your phones or devices.
Simplified Chinese have lesser strokes and are easier to write and remember than traditional characters. It is also more widely used. Traditional Chinese is only used mainly in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and parts of Malaysia and Singapore.
Japanese Writing
Now, let’s look at Japanese writing. In Japanese, you have three sets of characters or scripts, the Kanji, Hiragana, and Katakana.
In Japanese, you have three sets of characters or scripts, the Kanji, Hiragana, and Katakana.
The Kanji are essentially Chinese characters but in traditional script. This means Japanese characters are actually harder to write than Simplified Chinese.
On top of that, you have to learn how to write Hiragana and Katakana too. Both are types of syllabic writing systems.
In syllabic, you have a set of symbols/characters. However, instead of representing meaning (logographic), or a letter (alphabetic), it represents a syllable or sound.
You then string several of these symbols together to form a word. For example, the word Sashimi is written as さしみ (sa-shi-mi) in Hiragana and サシミ (sa-shi-mi) in Katakana. You can write Sashimi in Kanji too (刺身).
This means you must learn three scripts across two major writing systems to learn Japanese. You also need to learn when and how to use it. With Chinese, you learn one writing system and go with it.
You must learn three scripts across two major writing systems to learn Japanese. You also need to learn when and how to use it. With Chinese, you learn one writing system and go with it.
As a result, if you want to have an easier time learning the writing system, learn Chinese.
To Get Quick Wins
If you want to learn a language quickly, you may also want to learn Chinese instead of Japanese. This is because you do not need a lot of Chinese vocabulary to function in the language.
Chinese may have around 370,000 words, while Japanese around 200,000. These numbers are approximate, depending on which dictionary you are referring to.
With Chinese, you do not need a lot of words to be able to read common texts. In fact, You can already read up to 50% of the most common texts in Chinese with just 100 characters.
With Chinese, you do not need a lot of words to be able to read common texts. In fact, You can already read up to 50% of the most common texts in Chinese with just 100 characters.
With Japanese, you may be able to do the same. A vocabulary of 100 Japanese words should help you read up to 50% of common texts too. However, since there are three scripts in Japanese, you need to put in more effort than in Chinese.
There is another way to tell how little Chinese you need to function compared to Japanese. Let’s look at its proficiency examination.
For Chinese, the standard proficiency test is the HSK (Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi). For the beginner Level 1 test, you only need to be able to recognize around 150 words to pass. Passing HSK Level 1 should allow you to make basic phrases and converse with Chinese natives.
For the Japanese language, learners sit for the JLPT (Nihongo Nōryoku Shiken). To pass the basic N5 level, you need to learn around 800 words. This means it may be easier to pass the HSK Level 1 than the JLPT Level N5.
As a result, if you prefer to see quick wins out of your language learning effort, you may be better off learning Chinese instead of Japanese.
To Appreciate Chinese Culture
Finally, if you seem to enjoy Chinese over Japanese culture, then learning Chinese just makes more sense.
Chinese culture may be fascinating to many English speakers since it is a very ancient culture. Chinese culture today could be traced back to the Yellow River Civilization, based in northern China from 2100 BC.
Of course, things have changed a lot from the old civilization. However, it was these changes that attracted people. There is a lot of literature, clothing, music, and art to sample and enjoy.
With some Chinese language, you can enjoy and learn about the culture much better.
Why Should You Learn Japanese Over Chinese?
Lots of English-speaking people have more experience with Japanese culture than Chinese. As a result, many may feel the Japanese have more cultural significance than the Chinese.
Many may remember playing Japanese video games such as Tekken and Super Mario. Many may also grow up with Japanese anime or Manga, such as Dragon Ball.
To those more practical, you may have been told that Chinese is one of the hardest languages in the world to learn. So why not learn a more common language from Asia, such as Japanese?
This may make many English speakers prefer to learn Japanese over Chinese. However, there are more reasons you learning Japanese may be a better idea:
Easier Pronunciation
The Japanese language will be easier on the tongues of English speakers than Chinese. This is because the Japanese language is not tonal, unlike Chinese.
Japanese language is not tonal, unlike Chinese.
Mandarin Chinese is an example of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. One of the characteristics of this language family is tones. Chinese is no exception too. It is a tonal language.
Tones are used to help distinguish words with similar pronunciations. Tones are also why Chinese speakers may sound like they are ‘singing’ to the ears of native English speakers. Hence the rather offensive moniker ‘ching-chonging.’
Not all languages have a similar number of tones. Chinese have five tones. Some Chinese dialects, such as Cantonese, have nine tones.
If you learn Chinese pronunciation as an English speaker, you may have difficulty getting the tones right. This is because English does not have tones.
In fact, tones can be rather delicate. Pronounce the tones wrong, and the meaning of the word changes drastically.
For example, a tree (树, shù). It is pronounced in the fourth tone. However, if you pronounce it in the first tone (shū), it may mean a book (书), to lose (输), or to come (梳).
Japanese Pronunciations
You will not face this problem if you learn Japanese. With Japanese, you do not deal with tones. You just need to focus on the rhythm.
This is because English is a stress-timed language, while Japanese is a Mora-timed language. When you hear English, it has a Morse code-like rhythm, with rapid punches and long draws in random order.
Japanese would be quite similar to Italian, Spanish, or French language, where the rhythm is more consistent and stable, much like a train or an engine.
Getting the Japanese pronunciation and speech rhythm right for many English speakers is much easier than getting Chinese tones right. If you speak French language or are a Spanish speaker, you may find the Japanese language easier on your tongue.
Getting the Japanese pronunciation and speech rhythm right for many English speakers is much easier than getting Chinese tones right.
Supply And Demand In The Economy
If you are approaching the question from a supply and demand view, you may find learning Japanese better than Chinese.
Many may point out that the Chinese economy is much larger than Japan, and there is more demand for Chinese speakers worldwide. Those may be true since China’s economy is about four times the size of Japan’s.
But people who make these claims forget to look at another factor, which may be more important.
The factor? The number of people with Chinese-English proficiency. Since more Chinese people are learning English, the number of people with Chinese and English bilingualism is much higher.
On top of that, China actually outperformed Japan as a country in the worldwide English proficiency ranking. China is ranked 62nd worldwide, while Japan is ranked 80. This indicates that Japanese people generally have poorer English language skills than Chinese people.
What does this mean? There may be more demand for people with Japanese and English proficiency.
There may be more demand for people with Japanese and English proficiency.
This means there may be less competition for job and career openings for those capable of speaking English and Japanese.
You may not be able to assume the same with Chinese. It may be easier for Chinese companies to find workers with Chinese and English proficiency, whether in the business sector, tourism industry, or finance.
If you care about learning an Asian language for career and supply-demand reasons, Japanese may make more sense.
To Appreciate Japanese Culture
Finally, suppose you are into Japanese culture. In that case, you should disregard all the linguistic difficulties of the language and press on to learn it.
This is because if you can read and speak Japanese, you can learn and enjoy the culture much better.
You can watch Japanese anime or movies without subtitles, understanding the nuances of the lines much easier. You can also casually walk into shops in Japan and order food and buy produce.
Wrapping Up
If you are wondering, “Should I learn Chinese or Japanese?” there are many ways to justify your decision.
Looking at it from an economic and supply-demand standpoint, you may be better off with the Japanese. If you want an easier time pronouncing the words, Japanese may be good too.
However, if you prefer a simpler writing system and grammar, Chinese may give you a more enjoyable time. You may also be able to function in Chinese faster since you do not need to recognize too many words.
Regardless, which language to learn will depend on your personal decision. The key is to pick one language and go all the way when learning it. Enjoy the journey!