Flower in Japanese is 花, said hana. Seven strokes: the grass radical 艹 on top and 化 (change) beneath it, which supplies the sound ka. It is one of the first kanji Japanese children learn, and in classical poetry 花 on its own meant the cherry blossom. Written in hiragana it is はな, and in katakana ハナ.
Flower in Japanese
Flower in Japanese is 花, and the spoken word is hana. It is the word on the shop curtain of every florist, 花屋 (hanaya), and the word a child uses for the dandelion in a crack in the pavement. Any flower, any blossom, wild or bought.
Then spring arrives, and the word narrows. In late March, when a colleague asks 花はもう咲いた？ (hana wa mou saita?), has the flower opened yet, nobody wonders which flower. They mean the cherry trees. Phrases like 花の便り (hana no tayori), news of the blossoms, and 花冷え (hanabie), the cold snap of blossom time, all trust you to hear 桜 (sakura).
That habit is nearly a thousand years old. It is why the spring outing to sit under the cherries is called 花見 (hanami), flower viewing, and not cherry viewing.
Hana Meaning
Hana (花) means flower, blossom, or bloom. In hiragana it is はな, in katakana ハナ, and it is said “hah-nah,” two even beats. The on’yomi カ (ka) does the work in compounds, as in 花瓶 (kabin, a vase) and 開花 (kaika, coming into bloom).
Like the English word, it stretches. 花 is the best part of something, as in 今が花 (ima ga hana), now is the best time of one’s life. It can mean the art of flower arranging, so お花の先生 is an ikebana teacher. And in old poetry it is the cherry blossom, a sense dictionaries date to the late Heian period. Earlier, in the eighth-century 万葉集 (Man’yōshū), 花 could just as well mean the plum, the favourite blossom of Nara-period poets.
There is a second character read hana: 華. It means splendour and brilliance, the flower as glamour rather than plant. It appears in 華やか (hanayaka, gorgeous, showy), 華道 (kadou, the way of flowers, another name for ikebana), and 中華 (chuuka, Chinese, as in Chinese food). Dictionaries are clear on the rule: for actual plants, write 花.
And one more hana to watch for: 鼻, the nose. The two are told apart by pitch. In standard Tokyo speech, 鼻 stays flat, while 花 rises and then drops on the particle after it, so 花が and 鼻が sound subtly different. In writing, the kanji settles it.
The Kanji for Flower: 花
- Character: 花
- On’yomi: カ (ka)
- Kun’yomi: はな (hana)
- Stroke count: 7
- General meaning: flower, blossom; the best or most beautiful part of something
- Radical: 艸 (grass), Kangxi radical 140, written 艹 on top and called くさかんむり (kusakanmuri), the grass crown
It is taught in the first year of Japanese primary school, alongside the numbers, the sun and the moon.
Japanese Symbol for Flower
花 is a phono-semantic compound, built from a meaning part and a sound part.
The meaning part is the grass crown, 艹, the same element on top of 草 (kusa, grass), 茶 (cha, tea) and 薬 (kusuri, medicine). Almost everything under it is a plant or comes from one.
The sound part is 化, which on its own means change and is read ka. It is there to tell a reader how 花 sounds. Teachers like to add that a flower is a plant in the middle of changing, bud into bloom into seed, and as a memory aid it works well, but the job 化 was given is phonetic.
The more surprising story is how young the character is. Ancient Chinese texts wrote flower as 華, the same character that now means splendour. 花 does not appear before the Han and Wei dynasties, and the scholar Shirakawa Shizuka judged it most likely a new coinage of the Northern Wei, around the fifth century. So the everyday character is the newcomer, and the grand one, 華, is the original flower.
How to Write 花 in Japanese
Seven strokes, top to bottom: the grass crown in three, then 化 in four.
The crown is a horizontal and two short verticals that cross it. Keep it wide and shallow. It is a roof for everything below, so it should be at least as wide as 化.
Then 化. The left side is 亻, the person radical: a short stroke falling to the left, then a vertical dropping from its middle. The right side is 匕 in two strokes: first a short stroke slanting down to the left, then the long one that drops, curves along the bottom, and flicks up to the right.
The finishing flick is the character’s signature. Give it room. If the curve of the last stroke is cramped under the crown, the whole character tips forward.
How to Say Flower in Japanese
Hana is two even beats: “hah-nah,” both vowels open as in “father.” There is no stress in the English sense. The on’yomi ka is a single short “kah.”
Real sentences:
- 花が咲きました。(Hana ga sakimashita.) The flowers have bloomed.
- きれいな花ですね。(Kirei na hana desu ne.) What a pretty flower.
- 母に花を買いました。(Haha ni hana o kaimashita.) I bought flowers for my mother.
- 週末、花見に行こう。(Shuumatsu, hanami ni ikou.) Let’s go cherry blossom viewing this weekend.
- 花粉症がひどい。(Kafunshou ga hidoi.) My hay fever is terrible.
The verb for blooming is 咲く (saku), and you will hear it everywhere in March and April. The opposite, 散る (chiru), is what petals do when they fall, a word poets have leaned on for centuries.
Words and Compounds With 花
| Word | Reading | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 花見 | hanami | flower viewing, usually of cherry blossoms |
| 花火 | hanabi | fireworks, literally fire flowers |
| 花束 | hanataba | a bouquet |
| 花びら | hanabira | a petal |
| 花瓶 | kabin | a vase |
| 生け花 | ikebana | flower arranging |
| 花言葉 | hanakotoba | the language of flowers |
| 花嫁 | hanayome | a bride |
| 花粉症 | kafunshou | hay fever, literally pollen illness |
| 開花 | kaika | blooming, coming into flower |
花火 is the one to love. Summer fireworks in Japan are called fire flowers, and the classic Japanese shell opens into a perfectly round bloom. 花粉症, on the other hand, is the spring curse that sends a good share of every train carriage into masks.
Two sayings are worth having. 花より団子 (hana yori dango), dumplings over flowers, teases anyone who goes to a cherry blossom party for the food. And 高嶺の花 (takane no hana), a flower on a high peak, is someone or something you can admire but never reach.
Flower in Japanese Culture
Japan watches its flowers officially. Every spring, the Japan Meteorological Agency observes a sample cherry tree, usually a ソメイヨシノ (Somei-Yoshino), at its observatories and declares the blossom open on the first day that five or six flowers have opened on it. Tokyo’s sample tree has been at Yasukuni Shrine since 1966, and the moment it qualifies is national news. That declaration starts the hanami season, the picnics under the branches that this whole page keeps coming back to.
Flowers also carry messages. Under hanakotoba, the language of flowers, each bloom has an assigned meaning, so a bouquet can say love, or apology, or mourning without a word. Bring the wrong stem to a hospital and you will hear about it.
And flowers became an art. The Ikenobo school of ikebana points to 1462, when a Zen monk’s diary recorded that Senkei Ikenobo, a priest of the 六角堂 (Rokkakudō) temple in Kyoto, was invited by a warrior to arrange flowers and that the people of the city praised them. The school is still based at the Rokkakudō.
The word even reached the stage. For the Noh master Zeami, 花 was the quality that makes an audience catch its breath, the bloom of a performance rather than of a plant. And in haiku, 花 standing alone is a spring season word, and it still means the cherry.
As a Tattoo
花 is one of the gentlest characters you can choose, and it reads exactly as intended: flower, blossom, bloom. There is no hidden harsh meaning and no awkward register. A Japanese reader sees a pretty, common word.
Know that it is common. 花 appears in countless girls’ names, from the old-fashioned 花子 (Hanako) onward, so on skin it can read a little like a name as much as a word.
Consider 華 if you want glamour. 華 means flower in the sense of splendour and brilliance, and it looks grander. The catch is that it also means China, as in 中華, so it is not a neutral swap.
Check pairings carefully. 花火 is fireworks, 花粉 is pollen, and 花嫁 is a bride. Kanji set side by side form dictionary words, not a sum of ideas. If you have a particular flower in mind, its own name says more: 桜 (sakura, cherry), 蓮 (hasu, lotus), 菊 (kiku, chrysanthemum). Each also carries its own hanakotoba meaning, so check that before you commit.
On script: 花 is written identically in Japanese, simplified Chinese and traditional Chinese. 華 is the one that changes: simplified Chinese writes it 华. In Mandarin, 花 is read huā.
Seven strokes with an open crown is comfortable at small sizes. The thin hook at the end of the last stroke is the detail most likely to soften over time, so ask for it to be drawn clearly.
Confirm with a native speaker before you ink. You can preview the character in vertical and horizontal layouts with the Japanese Tattoo Generator, and read the wider background in our guide to japanese tattoo meanings.
Related Kanji
For more characters drawn from the natural world, browse the kanji library.
Sources and Further Reading
- 常用漢字表 (Jōyō Kanji Table, 2010), Agency for Cultural Affairs the readings カ and はな for 花, and カ, ケ and はな for 華
- 花 in KANJIDIC2, WWWJDIC, Electronic Dictionary Research and Development Group seven strokes, radical 140 and first-grade status
- 花, Digital Daijisen, Nihon Kokugo Daijiten and Jitsū (Kotobank) the cherry blossom sense from the late Heian period, the plum in the Man'yōshū, Zeami's flower, the rule to write 花 for plants, and the Northern Wei origin of the character
- 東京のさくら (Tokyo Cherry Blossoms), Japan Meteorological Agency the five or six flowers rule and the Yasukuni Shrine sample tree since 1966
- History of Ikebana, Ikenobo Senkei Ikenobo of the Rokkakudō and the 1462 record in the Hekizan Nichiroku
FAQ
How do you say flower in Japanese?
You say hana, written 花. Two even beats, “hah-nah,” with open vowels. It works for any flower or blossom. In compounds the character is often read ka, as in 花瓶 (kabin, a vase) and 開花 (kaika, blooming). The verb for a flower opening is 咲く (saku).
What is the kanji for flower?
The kanji for flower is 花, seven strokes. It combines the grass radical 艹, Kangxi number 140, with 化, which supplies the sound ka. Its readings are はな (hana) and カ (ka), and it is taught in the first year of primary school.
What is the difference between 花 and 華?
Both are read hana. 花 is the everyday character for a real flower or blossom. 華 means splendour or brilliance and appears in words such as 華やか (hanayaka, gorgeous) and 中華 (chuuka, Chinese). For actual plants, dictionaries say to write 花. Historically 華 is the older of the two.
Why does hana mean cherry blossom?
Because the cherry became the flower of Japanese poetry. In the eighth century 花 could still mean the plum, but by the late Heian period 花 alone was understood as the cherry blossom. That is why flower viewing, 花見 (hanami), means cherry viewing.
Is hana the same word as nose in Japanese?
They sound alike but are different words. 花 is flower and 鼻 is nose, both read hana. In standard Tokyo pitch, 鼻 is flat while 花 drops on the particle that follows it, so 花が and 鼻が differ slightly. In writing, the kanji removes any doubt.
Is 花 the same character in Chinese?
Yes. Japanese, simplified Chinese, and traditional Chinese all write 花, and it means flower in all of them. The Mandarin reading is huā. The related 華 does change: simplified Chinese writes it 华, so check which form a reference image uses before copying it.