Ku (kana)

く, in hiragana or ク in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. Both represent and their shapes come from the kanji 久.

This kana may have a dakuten added, transforming it into ぐ in hiragana, グ in katakana and gu in Hepburn romanization. The dakuten's addition also changes the sound of the mora represented, to in initial positions and varying between and in the middle of words.

A handakuten (゜) does not occur with ku in normal Japanese text, but it may be used by linguists to indicate a nasal pronunciation .

In the Ainu language, the katakana ク can be written as small ㇰ, representing a final k sound as in アイヌイタㇰ Ainu itak (Ainu language). This was developed along with other extended katakana to represent sounds in Ainu that are not found in standard Japanese katakana.

Forms	Rōmaji	Hiragana	Katakana
Normal k- (か行 ka-gyō)	ku	く	ク
	kuu, kwu kū	くう, くぅ くー	クウ, クゥ クー
Addition dakuten g- (が行 ga-gyō)	gu	ぐ	グ
	guu, gwu gū	ぐう, ぐぅ ぐー	グウ, グゥ グー

Other additional forms
Form A (kw-) Romaji Hiragana Katakana kwa くぁ, くゎ クァ, クヮ kwi くぃ クィ (kwu) (くぅ) (クゥ) kwe くぇ クェ kwo くぉ クォ	Form B (gw-) Romaji Hiragana Katakana gwa ぐぁ, ぐゎ グァ, グヮ gwi ぐぃ グィ (gwu) (ぐぅ) (グゥ) gwe ぐぇ グェ gwo ぐぉ グォ

Stroke order

Stroke order in writing く Stroke order in writing く

Stroke order in writing ク Stroke order in writing ク

File:く-bw.png

Stroke order in writing く

File:ク-bw.png

Stroke order in writing ク

Other communicative representations

• Full Braille representation

く / ク in Japanese Braille
く / ク ku	ぐ / グ gu	くう / クー kū	ぐう / グー gū	Other kana based on Braille く
				きゅ / キュ kyu	ぎゅ / ギュ gyu	きゅう / キュー kyū	ぎゅう / ギュー gyū
Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell	Template:Braille cell

• Computer encodings