Tsu (kana)

"ツ" redirects here. Not to be confused with Shi (kana) ("シ").

tsu
hiragana katakana
transliteration	tsu, tu
translit. with dakuten	zu, dzu, du
hiragana origin	川
katakana origin	川
spelling kana	つるかめのツ (Tsurukame no "tsu")
unicode	U+3064, U+30C4
braille

つ, in hiragana, or ツ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represents one mora. Both are phonemically /tu͍/ although for phonological reasons, the actual pronunciation is [tsɯ] .

The small kana っ/ッ, known as sokuon, are identical but somewhat smaller. They are mainly used to indicate consonant gemination and commonly used at the end of lines of dialogue in fictional works as a symbol for a glottal stop.

The dakuten forms づ, ヅ, pronounced the same as the dakuten forms of the su kana in most dialects (see yotsugana), are uncommon. They are primarily used for indicating a voiced consonant in the middle of a compound word (see rendaku), and they can never begin a word.

In the Ainu language, it can be written with a handakuten (which can be entered into a computer as either one character (ツ゚) or two combined characters (ツ゜) to represent the sound [tu͍], which is interchangeable with the katakana ト゚.

The katakana form has become popular as an emoticon in the Western world due to its resemblance to a smiling face.

Forms	Rōmaji	Hiragana	Katakana
Normal ts- (た行 ta-gyō)	tsu	つ	ツ
	tsuu tsū	つう, つぅ つー	ツウ, ツゥ ツー
Addition dakuten d/z- (だ行 da-gyō)	du, zu, dzu	づ	ヅ
	duu, zuu dzuu, dū zū, dzū	づう, づぅ づー	ヅウ, ヅゥ ヅー

Other additional forms
Form A (ts-) Romaji Hiragana Katakana tsa つぁ ツァ tsi つぃ ツィ tsu つ ツ tse つぇ ツェ tso つぉ ツォ tsyu つゅ ツュ	Form B (zw-) Romaji Hiragana Katakana zwa づぁ ヅァ zwi づぃ ヅィ dzu づ ヅ zwe づぇ ヅェ zwo づぉ ヅォ

• ヅァ, ヅェ and ヅォ are used in gairaigos, these pronunciations are not same as ズァ (zwa), ズェ (zwe) and ズォ (zwo).

Stroke order

Stroke order in writing つ

Stroke order in writing ツ

Stroke order in writing つ

Stroke order in writing ツ

Other communicative representations

Japanese radiotelephony alphabet	Wabun code
つるかめのツ Tsurukame no "Tsu"

Japanese Navy Signal Flag	Japanese semaphore	Japanese manual syllabary (fingerspelling)	Braille dots-1345 Japanese Braille

• Full Braille representation

つ / ツ in Japanese Braille
っ / ッ sokuon	つ / ツ tsu	づ / ヅ zu/du	つう / ツー tsū	づう / ヅー zū/dū	Other kana based on Braille つ
					ちゅ / チュ chu	ぢゅ / ヂュ ju/dyu	ちゅう / チュー chū	ぢゅう / ヂュー jū/dyū

• Computer encodings

Character information

Preview	つ		ツ		ﾂ
Unicode name	HIRAGANA LETTER TSU		KATAKANA LETTER TSU		HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER TSU
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	12388	U+3064	12484	U+30C4	65410	U+FF82
UTF-8	227 129 164	E3 81 A4	227 131 132	E3 83 84	239 190 130	EF BE 82
Numeric character reference	つ	つ	ツ	ツ	ﾂ	ﾂ
Shift JIS	130 194	82 C2	131 99	83 63	194	C2

Character information

Preview	っ		ッ		づ		ヅ
Unicode name	HIRAGANA LETTER SMALL TSU		KATAKANA LETTER SMALL TSU		HIRAGANA LETTER ZU		KATAKANA LETTER ZU
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	12387	U+3063	12483	U+30C3	12389	U+3065	12485	U+30C5
UTF-8	227 129 163	E3 81 A3	227 131 131	E3 83 83	227 129 165	E3 81 A5	227 131 133	E3 83 85
Numeric character reference	っ	っ	ッ	ッ	づ	づ	ヅ	ヅ
Shift JIS	130 193	82 C1	131 98	83 62	130 195	82 C3	131 100	83 64

See also

• Sokuon