Ku (kana)

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

ku
hiragana katakana
transliteration	ku
translit. with dakuten	gu
translit. with handakuten	(ngu)
hiragana origin	久
katakana origin	久
Man'yōgana	久 九 口 丘 苦 鳩 来
Voiced Man'yōgana	具 遇 隅 求 愚 虞
spelling kana	クラブのク (Kurabu no "ku")

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 syllable represented, to [ɡu͍] in initial positions and varying between [ŋu͍] and [ɣu͍] 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 [ŋu͍].

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).[1] 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 kū	くう, くぅ くー	クウ, クゥ クー
Addition dakuten g- (が行 ga-gyō)	gu	ぐ	グ
	guu 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/くゐ クィ/クヰ 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/ぐゐ グィ/グヰ 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 ク

Stroke order in writing く

Stroke order in writing ク

Other communicative representations

Japanese radiotelephony alphabet	Wabun code
クラブのク Kurabu no "Ku"	▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄

Japanese Navy Signal Flag	Japanese semaphore	Japanese manual syllabary (fingerspelling)	Braille dots-146 Japanese Braille

• 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

• Computer encodings

Character information

Preview	く		ク		ｸ		ㇰ		㋗
Unicode name	HIRAGANA LETTER KU		KATAKANA LETTER KU		HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER KU		KATAKANA LETTER SMALL KU		CIRCLED KATAKANA KU
Encodings	decimal	hex	decimal	hex	decimal	hex	decimal	hex	decimal	hex
Unicode	12367	U+304F	12463	U+30AF	65400	U+FF78	12784	U+31F0	13015	U+32D7
UTF-8	227 129 143	E3 81 8F	227 130 175	E3 82 AF	239 189 184	EF BD B8	227 135 176	E3 87 B0	227 139 151	E3 8B 97
Numeric character reference	く	く	ク	ク	ｸ	ｸ	ㇰ	ㇰ	㋗	㋗
Shift JIS (plain)[2]	130 173	82 AD	131 78	83 4E	184	B8
Shift JIS-2004[3]	130 173	82 AD	131 78	83 4E	184	B8	131 236	83 EC
EUC-JP (plain)[4]	164 175	A4 AF	165 175	A5 AF	142 184	8E B8
EUC-JIS-2004[5]	164 175	A4 AF	165 175	A5 AF	142 184	8E B8	166 238	A6 EE
GB 18030[6]	164 175	A4 AF	165 175	A5 AF	132 49 152 48	84 31 98 30	129 57 188 52	81 39 BC 34
EUC-KR[7] / UHC[8]	170 175	AA AF	171 175	AB AF
Big5 (non-ETEN kana)[9]	198 179	C6 B3	199 71	C7 47
Big5 (ETEN / HKSCS)[10]	198 245	C6 F5	199 171	C7 AB

Character information

Preview	ぐ		グ		く゚		ク゚
Unicode name	HIRAGANA LETTER GU		KATAKANA LETTER GU		HIRAGANA LETTER BIDAKUON NGU[11]		KATAKANA LETTER BIDAKUON NGU[11]
Encodings	decimal	hex	decimal	hex	decimal	hex	decimal	hex
Unicode	12368	U+3050	12464	U+30B0	12367 12442	U+304F+309A	12463 12442	U+30AF+309A
UTF-8	227 129 144	E3 81 90	227 130 176	E3 82 B0	227 129 143 227 130 154	E3 81 8F E3 82 9A	227 130 175 227 130 154	E3 82 AF E3 82 9A
Numeric character reference	ぐ	ぐ	グ	グ	く゚	く゚	ク゚	ク゚
Shift JIS (plain)[2]	130 174	82 AE	131 79	83 4F
Shift JIS-2004[3]	130 174	82 AE	131 79	83 4F	130 247	82 F7	131 153	83 99
EUC-JP (plain)[4]	164 176	A4 B0	165 176	A5 B0
EUC-JIS-2004[5]	164 176	A4 B0	165 176	A5 B0	164 249	A4 F9	165 249	A5 F9
GB 18030[6]	164 176	A4 B0	165 176	A5 B0
EUC-KR[7] / UHC[8]	170 176	AA B0	171 176	AB B0
Big5 (non-ETEN kana)[9]	198 180	C6 B4	199 72	C7 48
Big5 (ETEN / HKSCS)[10]	198 246	C6 F6	199 172	C7 AC

References

1. http://www.alanwood.net/unicode/katakana_phonetic_extensions.html
2. Unicode Consortium (2015-12-02) [1994-03-08]. "Shift-JIS to Unicode".
3. Project X0213 (2009-05-03). "Shift_JIS-2004 (JIS X 0213:2004 Appendix 1) vs Unicode mapping table".
4. Unicode Consortium; IBM. "EUC-JP-2007". International Components for Unicode.
5. Project X0213 (2009-05-03). "EUC-JIS-2004 (JIS X 0213:2004 Appendix 3) vs Unicode mapping table".
6. Standardization Administration of China (SAC) (2005-11-18). GB 18030-2005: Information Technology—Chinese coded character set.
7. Unicode Consortium; IBM. "IBM-970". International Components for Unicode.
8. Steele, Shawn (2000). "cp949 to Unicode table". Microsoft / Unicode Consortium.
9. Unicode Consortium (2015-12-02) [1994-02-11]. "BIG5 to Unicode table (complete)".
10. van Kesteren, Anne. "big5". Encoding Standard. WHATWG.
11. Unicode Consortium. "Unicode Named Character Sequences". Unicode Character Database.