らしい ①Seems like, Apparently, I heard

Most Recent Replies (14 in total)

• 

  Pushindawood

  seems like
  (I) heard

  Structure

  • Verb + らしい
  • Noun + らしい
  • Adj + らしい
  • なAdj + らしい

  [Conjecture/hearsay・based on indirect information・some confidence]
  [Mostly auditory・“typically representative of” meaning only applies to nouns]

  View on Bunpro

• 

  Pep95

  What do the 1 and 2 mean here?

• 

  Pushindawood

  @Pep95 While らしい① and らしい② may look the same, they express two different things. らしい① focuses on conjecture/hearsay, while らしい② focuses on expressing that someone/something meets the standards of something or expresses the typical traits of something. Cheers!

• 

  seanblue

  あなたの元彼女が婚約したらしいです。

  Why is そう not a valid answer here?

• 

  ArsDiaboli

  Not sure but, probably because it’s only from rumor? If it was the (だ)そう, you’d probably say that you heard it according to X (友達によるとあなたの元彼女が結婚したそうだ), while if it was the other そう, wouldn’t it be wrong altogether since that one refers to things that you are physically seeing (雨が降りそう)? Because there’s no other indication of it being a (だ)そう, I assume らしい fits better.

  Do correct me if I’m wrong please

• 

  mrnoone

  @seanblue @ArsDiaboli

  Hey

  Since there is no context, those two are interchangeable.

  The difference is basically like this:
  らしい is a conjectural expression, so it is some kind of guess based on what you heard
  そうだ is not conjectural, it is reporting what you have heard

  So, for example, when 彼は結婚したらしい is used, then it means that the speaker heard that the person in question was on honeymoon or something like that and this is his guess based on the information.
  If そうだ was used, that would mean that he has heard from someone that the person married.

  By the way, the less “guesswork” is used, the closer it is to そうだ。

  (Of course, I am talking about そうだ hearsay, just to be clear

• 

  Quemaqua

  I must confess, even with the nuance hints, I still can’t keep these straight. I suppose because I just don’t use them very often in conversation myself. I can comprehend the differences between them just fine, and I know the words themselves from seeing them used in native matierlas I read, but I just can’t ever seem to nail down which one I’m suppose to be using when trying to use them myself. If you guys ever find a really good way to differentiate these in one’s mind, I will be forever in your debt.

• 

  GregX999

  I just came here looking for clarification on this too - I keep mixing up らしい and そうだ and have no ideas, even after seeing the answer, why one is correct and the other isn’t.

  I just end up memorizing which one goes in which sample sentence, which isn’t helping me at all, as I’m “passing” the reviews without actually learning why.

• 

  mrnoone

  @GregX999
  In most cases those two can be considered completely interchangeable, if there is no wider context.

• 

  warioblast

  魔王さまはしばらくマクロナルドで働いていたらしい。

  I heard that the Demon King worked at McRonald for some time.

  I don’t understand whats going on here ? What’s the reference ? Is it from an anime or a manga ?

• 

  mrnoone

  Hataraku Maou-sama! reference. Since the sentence sounds a bit strange, the らしい sticks in memory

• 

  warioblast

  Thanks !!

• 

  Glaciem52

  What’s らしい and * と聞きいた** as I heard ?

• 

  MikkaT

  Hi, I’m wondering why らしい does not need any kind of だ like ようだ or そうだ.
  The よ in this example would have needed a だ after the noun as well if the らしい wasn’t there. So does らしい take the place of だ as well?
• 

  Fuga

  Hey @MikkaT !

  Since らしい could also be a auxiliary adjective, it sounds very unnatural when だ is used after it! It is similar to how using だ after い-adjectives sound unnatural.

  We hope this answers your question!