Setting up a Japanese IME on your computer

What an IME is

Your keyboard has 26 letters. Japanese needs about 46 kana, plus thousands of kanji. An IME — Input Method Editor — is the thing in between: you type Latin letters, it turns them into kana, and then you pick kanji if you want them.

It belongs to your operating system, not to any website. No site can type Japanese for you if your machine has no IME turned on.

Turning one on

• Windows — Settings → Time & language → Language & region → Add a language → Japanese. Once installed, switch with Windows + space.
• macOS — System Settings → Keyboard → Input Sources → add Japanese (Romaji). Switch with Control + space.
• Linux — install Mozc through your package manager, then add it in your desktop's input-method settings. The switch shortcut depends on the desktop.
• iOS and Android — add a Japanese keyboard in your keyboard settings. The 12-key kana layout is a different skill from the romaji one; pick romaji if you are also learning to type on a computer.

How romaji becomes kana

Most of it is direct: ka gives か, sa gives さ, mi gives み. A few spots catch people out:

The awkward ones

• っ (small tsu) — double the following consonant. きって is kitte, がっこう is gakkou.
• ん — type nn to be safe. A single n before a vowel merges into the next sound: kani gives かに, kanni gives かんに.
• Long vowels — ou or oo depending on the word. とうきょう is toukyou; typing tokyo gives you ときょ.
• しゃ / しゅ / しょ — sha, shu, sho. And ちゃ is cha, じゃ is ja.
• ふ is fu, and hu also works. づ is du and ぢ is di — both rare, but they appear in some words.

Checking it works

Switch to the Japanese IME and type nihongo. If you get にほんご you are done. If Latin letters still appear, either the keyboard has not switched or the IME is in its Latin mode — on Windows press 半角/全角 or Alt + `, on macOS press Control + space again.

Once that works, open a typing lesson and start. Practice here does not need kanji conversion: the sentence is given, and you type the kana.