Hanzi, kanji, and hanja are three lists

Kanji are Chinese in origin. That sentence is true and almost useless for study. Japanese did not adopt a word list. It adopted characters, then kept Japanese words and Japanese readings, and later simplified some shapes on its own schedule. Korean educational hanja are a third decision: characters for classical Chinese in school, while everyday writing is Hangul.

So “is kanji Chinese or Japanese?” The characters’ history is Chinese. The list, the readings, and many of the words are Japanese. 漢字, the word for the characters themselves, is read kanji in Japanese and hànzì in Mandarin.

3,500, 2,136, 1,800

Three official lists, three jobs:

• China, level 1 — 3,500 common characters in the 2013 table. Not a grade-1 list.
• Japan, jōyō — 2,136 general-use kanji, 2010, of which 1,026 are elementary.
• Korea, educational hanja — 1,800 characters, 900 for middle school and 900 for high school, the list announced on 30 December 2000 and described by the CSAT authority as the list applied from the 2014 exam.

[[chart:ld-script-lists]]

The first view is those three learner-facing lists. Switch to the wider Chinese totals and Japan’s 2,136 does not grow to meet China’s 6,500 or 8,105. The lists were not trying to be the same length. Overlap is real and large. It is not identity. I am not putting a “percent the same” on this chart, because a shared shape with a different reading is not one study item.

Simplified, traditional, or Japan’s own cut

“Is Japanese kanji traditional or simplified?” It is neither label. Mainland China uses the simplified forms in the 2013 standard. Taiwan and Hong Kong use traditional forms. Japan uses the shapes in the jōyō list, which simplified some characters (国, not 國) and kept others that China simplified differently. Korea’s school hanja are generally the traditional forms, because the subject is classical Chinese, not modern Mandarin.

手 means hand in both languages, taken alone. 手紙 means a letter in Japanese. It does not mean a letter in Mandarin. Store the word you will actually read. A card with the character and the gloss “hand” will congratulate you right up until the compound.

Stroke counts for eight pairs that really do differ — 门 is 3, 門 is 8 — are in the stroke article. The Chinese totals behind level 1 are in how many characters.

The nasty pairs are the ones that share a shape and not a word. 手紙 is a letter in Japanese and not a letter in Mandarin. 勉強 means study in Japanese. The simplified characters 勉强, in Mandarin, mean reluctantly, or barely. Same components, different lives. A card that says “study” will be wrong on half the pages you meet.

Why this method works

One card per language, even when the shape matches, stops the false friend early. You are not memorising “the character for hand” once for the planet. You are memorising the word you will read this month. The list sizes on the chart are only there so you do not wait for the lists to become the same length before you start.

Run this session

Twenty minutes. Four shapes, two languages if you study both. If you study one, do that language’s word only, and write the other language’s word as a trap you will not guess.

1. 0–4 min. From memory: China’s common set, Japan’s general-use list, Korea’s school hanja. 3,500, 2,136, 1,800. Check the first chart view.
2. 4–16 min. Cards: 手 in a Mandarin word (手机) and 手 in a Japanese word (手紙). Then 国 as you will write it — simplified 国, traditional 國, or the jōyō form, which is 国. One card per form you actually read. Cover the reading.
3. 16–20 min. Say whether 勉強 and 勉强 are the same word. They are not. If you hesitated, that pair is tomorrow’s first card.

Common traps

• “Kanji is just Chinese.” Fix: the history is Chinese. The word, the reading, and often the shape standard are not.
• A single deck tagged “CJK”. Fix: split the card the moment the gloss differs.
• Waiting to learn Japanese until you finish 8,105 hanzi, or the reverse. Fix: the lists were never meant to match. Start the one you read.

Retrieve the word in Study Lab. Sit JLPT or HSK when you want a timed paper in one of the languages. They are not the same exam, and this chart is why.