# I (kana)

kana gojūon :
| wa | ra | ya | ma | ha | na | ta | sa | ka | a |
| wi | ri | (yi) | mi | hi | ni | chi | shi | ki | i |
| (wu) | ru | yu | mu | fu | nu | tsu | su | ku | u |
| we | re | (ye) | me | he | ne | te | se | ke | e |
| wo | ro | yo | mo | ho | no | to | so | ko | o |
| | | | n | | | | | | |
Kana modifiers and marks :
sokuonfu (gemination)
yōon (palatalization)
chōonpu (vowel lengthener)
Iteration marks
dakuten/handakuten (voiced & semi-voiced marks) :
Multi-moraic kana :
iu
kashiko
koto
sama
shite
toki
tomo
nari
mairasesoro
yori :
vte :
I (い in hiragana or イ in katakana) is one of the Japanese kana each of which represents one mora. い is based on the sōsho style of the kanji character 以, and イ is from the radical (left part) of the kanji character 伊. In the modern Japanese system of sound order, it occupies the second position of the mora chart, between あ and う. Additionally, it is the first letter in Iroha, before ろ. Both represent the sound. In the Ainu language, katakana イ is written as y in their Latin-based mora chart, and a small ィ after another katakana represents a diphthong.
| Form | Rōmaji | Hiragana | Katakana |
| Normal a/i/u/e/o (あ行 a-gyō) | i | い | イ |
| Normal a/i/u/e/o (あ行 a-gyō) | ii, yi ī | いい, いぃ いー | イイ, イィ イー |
Other additional forms :
Form (y-) :
| Rōmaji | Hiragana | Katakana |
| yi | いぃ | イィ |
| ye | いぇ | イェ |

## Variant forms

Like other vowels, scaled-down versions of the kana (ぃ, ィ) are used to express sounds foreign to the Japanese language, such as フィ (fi). In some Okinawan writing systems, a small ぃ is also combined with the kana く (ku) and ふ to form the digraphs くぃ kwi and ふぃ hwi respectively, although the Ryukyu University system uses the kana ゐ/ヰ instead.

## Origin

い comes from the left part of the Kanji 以, while イ originates from the left part of the Kanji 伊. An alternate form - 𛀆, based on the full cursive form of 以 is one of the most common hentaigana, as it merged with い late in the development of modern Japanese writing.

## Stroke order

| Stroke order in writing い | Stroke order in writing イ |
The Hiragana い is made in two strokes:
* At the top left, a curved vertical stroke, ending with a hook at the bottom.
* At the top right, a shorter stroke, slightly curving in the opposite direction.
The Katakana イ is made in two strokes:
* At the top, a curved diagonal line going from right to left.
* In the center of the last stroke, a vertical line going down.

## Other communicative representations

| Japanese radiotelephony alphabet | Wabun code |
| いろはのイ Iroha no "I" | ▄ ▄▄▄ |
| Japanese Navy Signal Flag | Japanese semaphore | Japanese manual syllabary (fingerspelling) | Braille dots-12 Japanese Braille |
* Full Braille representation
い / イ in Japanese Braille :
| い / イ i | いい / イー ī | +い / +ー chōon* |
* When lengthening "-i" or "-e" morae in Japanese braille, a chōon is always used, as is standard in katakana orthography, instead of adding the い / イ kana.
* Computer encodings
Character information :
| Preview | い | い | イ | イ | ｲ | ｲ | ㋑ | ㋑ |
| Unicode name | HIRAGANA LETTER I | HIRAGANA LETTER I | KATAKANA LETTER I | KATAKANA LETTER I | HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER I | HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER I | CIRCLED KATAKANA I | CIRCLED KATAKANA I |
| Encodings | decimal | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex |
| Unicode | 12356 | U+3044 | 12452 | U+30A4 | 65394 | U+FF72 | 13009 | U+32D1 |
| UTF-8 | 227 129 132 | E3 81 84 | 227 130 164 | E3 82 A4 | 239 189 178 | EF BD B2 | 227 139 145 | E3 8B 91 |
| Numeric character reference | &#12356; | &#x3044; | &#12452; | &#x30A4; | &#65394; | &#xFF72; | &#13009; | &#x32D1; |
| Shift JIS | 130 162 | 82 A2 | 131 67 | 83 43 | 178 | B2 | | |
| EUC-JP | 164 164 | A4 A4 | 165 164 | A5 A4 | 142 178 | 8E B2 | | |
| GB 18030 | 164 164 | A4 A4 | 165 164 | A5 A4 | 132 49 151 52 | 84 31 97 34 | 129 57 209 55 | 81 39 D1 37 |
| EUC-KR / UHC | 170 164 | AA A4 | 171 164 | AB A4 | | | | |
| Big5 (non-ETEN kana) | 198 168 | C6 A8 | 198 251 | C6 FB | | | | |
| Big5 (ETEN / HKSCS) | 198 234 | C6 EA | 199 126 | C7 7E | | | | |
Character information :
| Preview | ぃ | ぃ | ィ | ィ | ｨ | ｨ |
| Unicode name | HIRAGANA LETTER SMALL I | HIRAGANA LETTER SMALL I | KATAKANA LETTER SMALL I | KATAKANA LETTER SMALL I | HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER SMALL I | HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER SMALL I |
| Encodings | decimal | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex |
| Unicode | 12355 | U+3043 | 12451 | U+30A3 | 65384 | U+FF68 |
| UTF-8 | 227 129 131 | E3 81 83 | 227 130 163 | E3 82 A3 | 239 189 168 | EF BD A8 |
| Numeric character reference | &#12355; | &#x3043; | &#12451; | &#x30A3; | &#65384; | &#xFF68; |
| Shift JIS | 130 161 | 82 A1 | 131 66 | 83 42 | 168 | A8 |
| EUC-JP | 164 163 | A4 A3 | 165 163 | A5 A3 | 142 168 | 8E A8 |
| GB 18030 | 164 163 | A4 A3 | 165 163 | A5 A3 | 132 49 150 52 | 84 31 96 34 |
| EUC-KR / UHC | 170 163 | AA A3 | 171 163 | AB A3 | | |
| Big5 (non-ETEN kana) | 198 167 | C6 A7 | 198 250 | C6 FA | | |
| Big5 (ETEN / HKSCS) | 198 233 | C6 E9 | 199 125 | C7 7D | | |

## Footnotes

* ↑ Where do the kana come from
* 1 2 Unicode Consortium (2015-12-02) [1994-03-08]. "Shift-JIS to Unicode".
* 1 2 Unicode Consortium; IBM. "EUC-JP-2007". International Components for Unicode.
* 1 2 Standardization Administration of China (SAC) (2005-11-18). GB 18030-2005: Information Technology—Chinese coded character set.
* 1 2 Unicode Consortium; IBM. "IBM-970". International Components for Unicode.
* 1 2 Steele, Shawn (2000). "cp949 to Unicode table". Microsoft / Unicode Consortium.
* 1 2 Unicode Consortium (2015-12-02) [1994-02-11]. "BIG5 to Unicode table (complete)".
* 1 2 van Kesteren, Anne. "big5". Encoding Standard. WHATWG.