やThings like, And the like

Cannot be used after verbs, unlike とか

Structure

Noun + や + Noun

Details

Part of Speech
Particle
Word Type
Sentence Ending Particle
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Standard

About や

や is a particle that has several different roles in Japanese, with the most common being as an adverbial particle. や is used similarly to と as 'and', but rather than listing specific things in a group, it lists 'things like (A)'.

や is always used to group nouns, and simply comes directly after them.

To compare how と and や are different, imagine that there is a bowl of fruit. In this bowl there are apples, oranges, and peaches. If と is used to list the apples and oranges, it would give the listener the impression that there are no peaches. This is called an 'exhaustive' list, meaning that all possibilities should be listed. However, if や is used, the listener would know that there are other things in the bowl apart from the apples and oranges. In this way, や is a better choice when you want to say 'and', but don't want to limit the group that you are listing.

Caution

や cannot be used after verb phrases. This is done with たり, or とか.

Synonyms

Examples

--:--

コンビニでお水(みず)やおかしを買(か)った。

I bought things like water and snacks at the convenience store.

ひらがなやカタカナや漢字(かんじ)があります。

There are things like Hiragana and Katakana and Kanji.

京都(きょうと)や東京(とうきょう)や大阪(おおさか)に行(い)きました。

I went to places like Kyoto and Tokyo and Osaka.

サッカーやテニスをするのが好(す)き。

I like playing sports like soccer and tennis.

果物(くだもの)や野菜(やさい)を食(た)べてください。

Please eat things like fruits and vegetables.

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Online
- Parallel Marker や
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Offline
- Genki I
  Page 216
- Marugoto Elementary 1 (A2) Rikai
  Page 57
- みんなの日本語 I
  Page 68 [CH 10]
- Genki I 2nd Edition
  Page 256
- [DBJG] A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar
  Page 536
- Tae Kim's Japanese Grammar Guide
  Page 69
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や – Grammar Discussion

Most Recent Replies (8 in total)

Inounx
Hi,
I have some trouble understanding this sentence:
冷蔵庫に肉や魚とかがあります
I don’t understand why the “とか” part is here, and what it means ?
I supposed it was the equivalent of “や” but as “や” is more formal than “とか” I am not sure why they would be mixed ?
Pushindawood
@Inounx Hey! You are right that や is usually considered more formal than とか, however, they both can be found together in the same sentence, especially in modern Japanese. Since や implies that not everything is listed and can only be used once in a sentence, any nouns listed after や can be accompanied by とか or など. Cheers!
Mino123
It’s not true that you can use や just once in a sentence, you can repeat it however times you need. However, I’ve read that in writing it’s better to use AやB、C、D rather than AやBやCやD, because it makes reading easier. But AやBやCやD is still very much correct. Here are some sources with citations:

https://jikobunseki-lab.com/ya-post-positional-particle/82/

3つ以上の名詞並べる際に、すべて「や」で並列するのも文法的に問題はありません。

https://bunsyou-kakikata.com/ya/

このように、『や』を使って関連した単語を繋ぎ合わせていくことは、文法として間違ってはいません。