Wo (kana)

wo
hiragana katakana
transliteration	(w)o
hiragana origin	遠
katakana origin	乎

を, in hiragana, or ヲ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represent one mora.

Modern usage

In Japanese, this kana is used almost exclusively for a particle; therefore, the katakana form (ヲ) is fairly uncommon in everyday language — mostly used as a stand-in for its hiragana counterpart in texts that need to be written entirely in katakana.

Despite originally representing [wo], the syllable is pronounced [o] by almost all modern speakers. Singers may pronounce it with the [w], as may those attempting to emphasize the syllable for clarity. But apart from some literate speakers who have revived [wo] as a spelling pronunciation, the onglide is extinct in the modern spoken language.

In Romaji, the kana is transliterated variably as ⟨o⟩ or ⟨wo⟩, with the former being faithful to standard pronunciation but the latter avoiding confusion with お and オ. Katakana ヲ can sometimes be combined with a dakuten, ヺ, to represent a /vo/ sound in foreign words; however, most IMEs lack a convenient way to do this. The combination ヴォ is used far more frequently to represent the /vo/ sound.

A "wo" sound is usually represented in katakana as ウォ instead. For example, ウォークマン (Wōkuman, "Walkman") and ウォッカ (Wokka, "Vodka")

Hiragana を is still used in several Okinawan orthographies for the syllable /o~wo/; in the Ryukyu University system it is /o/, whereas お is /ʔo/. Katakana ヲ is used in Ainu for /wo/.

Stroke order

Stroke order in writing を

Stroke order in writing ヲ

Stroke order in writing を

Stroke order in writing ヲ

Other representations

• Computer encodings

• Braille

を / ヲ in Japanese Braille
を / ヲ wo	をう / ヲー wō	ヺ vo	ヺー vō

• Japanese semaphore

Look up を or ヲ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.