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One of the best Japanese Kanji dictionary.
The kanji most commonly used for "Money" are 金、銭、財.
金
金 (kin / kane) does double duty: it is gold the metal and money in general — お金 (okane) is the everyday word for money, 料金 a fee, 金曜日 Friday (“gold day”). The character shows nuggets under earth, and it lends its radical to nearly everything metallic or monetary in the script.
銭 (sen / zeni) is coined money — small change. It named Japan’s old subunit (100 sen to a yen), and survives in words like 銭湯, the public bath you once paid a coin for, and in the salty flavour of zeni, “cash”. 財 (zai) is wealth as holdings: 財産 (assets), 財布 (the wallet that holds them), 財閥 (the great zaibatsu conglomerates).
貨 (ka) is money as currency — 通貨 (currency), 硬貨 (coins) — and 富 (fu / tomi) is riches, abundance itself: 富士山’s first character, fittingly, is “wealth”.
Everyday Japanese vocabulary built from the characters above.
金 alone reads as "gold/money" — bold but bald; a Japanese reader sees a price tag as easily as prosperity. If the meaning you want is abundance rather than cash, 富 (wealth, plenty) or 豊 (bountiful) read far more auspiciously. 銭 alone is small change — avoid unless you enjoy the irony.
What is Onyomi?
Onyomi, also known as the "Sino-Japanese reading," is one of the two main reading systems for kanji characters in Japanese. It refers to the reading of a kanji character that is derived from the original Chinese pronunciation.
What is Kunyomi?
Kunyomi, also known as the "native Japanese reading," is one of the two main reading systems for kanji characters in Japanese. It refers to the reading of a kanji character that is based on the native Japanese pronunciation. Kunyomi readings are often used when a kanji character stands alone or is followed by hiragana, as in verbs and adjectives. Mastering both kunyomi and onyomi is crucial for understanding and using kanji effectively in the Japanese language.
What is Radical?
A radical, also known as "bushu" in Japanese, is a fundamental component of kanji characters. Radicals are the building blocks of kanji and are used to categorize and organize them in dictionaries. There are 214 traditional radicals, each with its own meaning, which often provides a clue to the meaning of the kanji character it forms.
What is strokes?
Stroke count, or "kakusuu" in Japanese, refers to the number of individual brushstrokes required to write a kanji character. Each kanji has a specific stroke order and stroke count, which are essential for writing the character correctly and legibly. Understanding and following the correct stroke order not only ensures proper balance and aesthetics but also makes writing more efficient and fluid.