Is knowing hiragana and katakana enough?

You don’t need to learn hiragana/katakana right away. So many students want to rush into learning how to speak Japanese that they often run right past one of the most important parts: learning the Japanese alphabets hiragana and katakana. And learning them doesn’t even have to be hard.

Can you only use hiragana and katakana?

It is actually possible to write anything in Japanese using only Hiragana and Katakana which are the phonetic systems. Kanji are ideograms, so they do not represent specific sounds but ideas. In Latin languages, kanjis would be like the root meanings of the words.

Can you learn to speak Japanese but not read?

If I understand correctly, you want to be able to speak and understand Japanese with hearing, while omitting reading and writing. If that’s the case, yes it’s possible, although you would be able to speak and understand the language at a much faster rate if you also included reading and writing in your study.

Can you speak Japanese with only hiragana?

Yes, but it’s difficult. There’s a lot of ambiguity that’s fixed by Kanji. Multiple (distinguishable) Kanji have the same pronunciation while having the same furigana.

Can Japan survive without kanji?

The short answer is: yes, you can speak fluent Japanese and understand Japanese people without ever studying a single kanji. Besides, the kanji are easier than they look, believe in yourself!

How difficult is it to learn kanji?

Just treat kanji like an extension of the kana and it won’t be nearly as difficult/overwhelming. In today’s world of smartphones and predictive text, learning can come a whole lot faster (although not so much if you want to actually learn how to write longhand in Japanese).

Should I learn words first when learning Japanese?

In today’s world of smartphones and predictive text, learning can come a whole lot faster (although not so much if you want to actually learn how to write longhand in Japanese). And, yes you should learn words and generally absorb everything you can while you are learning the basic stuff.

Should I learn the words or just learn the characters?

So ideally, you should learn the words, but also learn the different ways the characters can be pronounced independent from that word. With each word, you should also have examples of how it can be used in a sentence, and a few of the conjugations for it so you can better recognize the word when you hear it in standard conversations.

Should I learn Kana first?

And, yes you should learn words and generally absorb everything you can while you are learning the basic stuff. Your brain doesn’t know the difference, just keep feeding it information and your language ability will grow. Just keep going. The kana are a great first step but you should keep the same focus and motivation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LYnozKOa8M