N4 grammar organizes into seven systems: the four conditionals (と・ば・たら・なら), giving & receiving (あげる・くれる・もらう), the potential form, the volitional (～よう), the passive, the causative, and experience/change patterns (～たことがある, ～ようになる). N4 rewards understanding relationships - conditions, direction, and social perspective - not just memorizing endings.
N5 taught you to build sentences. N4 teaches you to connect them - if this, then that; someone did this for me; I can do this; it became possible. This is the level where Japanese stops being a list of phrases and starts being a system of relationships. It’s also where a lot of self-studiers stall, because English hides the very distinctions N4 makes explicit.
The good news: N4’s ~150 patterns are far more organized than they look. Learn these seven systems deeply and the rest are recombinations. Here they are, ranked by how much they carry.
The N4 Grammar Priority Map
| # | Grammar System | Why It Carries the Exam | Leverage |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Four conditionals と・ば・たら・なら | The most-tested N4 topic; English can’t tell them apart | S |
| 2 | Giving & receiving あげる・くれる・もらう | Encodes direction and social perspective | S |
| 3 | Potential form (can do) | Ability - and the が-object shift | A |
| 4 | Passive 〜られる | Perspective + the “suffering passive” | A |
| 5 | Causative 〜させる | Make/let someone do - and causative-passive | A |
| 6 | Volitional 〜(よ)う / ～ようと思う | Intention and “let’s” in plain form | B |
| 7 | ～たことがある / ～ようになる | Experience and change of state | B |
1. The Four Conditionals: と, ば, たら, なら
This is the defining N4 challenge. English says “if” for all four; Japanese chooses based on the logic of the condition. Get this table into your bones.
| Form | Core meaning | Restriction |
|---|---|---|
| と | Automatic, natural, always-true result | 2nd clause can’t be a request/command |
| ば | General/hypothetical condition | Usually no request if same subject |
| たら | Flexible “if / when / after” (one-time) | Fewest restrictions - the safe default |
| なら | “If that’s the case” (responds to context) | Reacts to what was just said/known |
Note the request in the second clause - と could not do this. This is why たら is the all-purpose conditional at N4.
2. Giving & Receiving: あげる, くれる, もらう
The single most “Japanese” grammar at N4. The language forces you to encode whose side you’re on when something is given. English has one word (“give”); Japanese has two, split by direction.
Same event, opposite verb. くれる is chosen because the gift moves toward the speaker’s side. You can never use あげる for “gives to me.”
Attaching these to the te-form (～てあげる/くれる/もらう) is the higher-value skill: it expresses doing an action as a favor, with the same directional logic.
3. The Potential Form: Expressing Ability
The key shift: the object particle changes from を to が. It’s 漢字が読める, not 漢字を. Godan verbs shift う→える (読む→読める); ichidan add られる (食べる→食べられる); する→できる.
4. The Passive: 〜られる and the “Suffering” Nuance
This is the concept English lacks: Japanese can put an affected victim as the subject of a passive, even for intransitive verbs like “rain.” The nuance is “it happened to me and it was a nuisance.”
5. The Causative: Making and Letting
Whether it’s “make” (force) or “let” (allow) comes from context and particles. に often signals “let,” while を on a person can lean toward “make.”
The causative-passive is the N4 boss fight: “someone made me do X and I didn’t want to.” Recognizing 〜せられる / 〜させられる on sight is worth real exam points.
6. The Volitional: 〜(よ)う and 〜ようと思う
～(よ)う is the plain-form “let’s” (行こう = let’s go). Add と思う and it becomes “I intend to / I’m thinking of” - the standard way to state a personal plan.
7. Experience & Change: ～たことがある and ～ようになる
Uses the plain past + ことがある. Compare with the non-past 登ることがある = “there are times I climb,” a different meaning entirely.
How to Actually Master N4 Grammar
N4 fails learners who memorize endings but never internalize the relationships. Three moves fix that:
- Study the conditionals and giving/receiving as contrast sets. Never learn たら alone - learn it against と, ば, and なら in minimal-pair sentences so the differences become visible.
- Drill perspective forms with a fixed cast. Use “I / my friend / the teacher” consistently so あげる vs くれる and passive vs causative become about direction, not vocabulary.
- Cloze-test yourself with spaced repetition. The JLPT grammar section blanks out exactly these patterns. Kanjijo’s SRS resurfaces each point right before you’d forget it, inside a full example sentence.
- Full N4 grammar bank
- SRS spaced repetition
- Kanji & vocab mnemonics
- OCR scanner
- Home & lock screen widgets
- Interactive test widget
- JLPT reading practice
- JLPT listening practice
- Full mock JLPT tests
- Conversation & shadowing
- Zen design
Related Reading on Kanjijo
Deep Dives: Individual Points in Detail
Each of the points below previously lived on its own page. They are collected here so the whole level sits in one place.
N4 〜たことがある: The Experience Grammar Every Traveller Actually Uses
Walk into any first-time conversation in Japan and within five minutes you will be asked: 日本に来たことがありますか？「Have you ever been to Japan?」 The answer-shaped grammar is N4’s most reused export. Master it cleanly and you can hold ten minutes of conversation about your life experiences with one pattern.
1. The Construction
| Form | Pattern | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Affirmative | V-た + ことがある | 日本に行ったことがあります |
| Negative | V-た + ことがない | 寿司を食べたことがない |
| Question | 〜たことがありますか | 富士山に登ったことがありますか |
| Emphatic never | 一度も + 〜たことがない | 一度も会ったことがない |
2. The Past-Only Trap
The grammar implies temporal distance - the experience happened a while ago. Saying 「さっき寿司を食べたことがある」 sounds wrong because さっき is too recent. For very recent past, use 〜たばかり: 「さっき寿司を食べたばかり」.
3. The Frequency Pattern
To talk about how often: use 〜回, 〜度. 「日本に三回行ったことがあります」(I’ve been to Japan three times). Combine with 一度だけ for “just once”.
4. The Subtle Nuance
〜たことがある emphasises that the experience exists in your history; it does not give weight to when. So 「沖縄に行ったことがある」does not commit to recently or long ago. Compare with the past simple 「沖縄に行きました」which suggests a specific time.
5. The N3 Continuation
At N3 the pattern extends into 〜ことがある (without past) meaning “there are times when”: 「忙しくて昼ごはんを食べないことがある」. Same skeleton, different tense placement, very different meaning.
6. The 5-Sentence Drill
- 京都に行ったことがあります。
- 納豆を食べたことがありません。
- 富士山に登ったことがありますか。
- 一度も雪を見たことがない。
- その映画を二回見たことがある。
Related Reading on Kanjijo
Frequently Asked Questions
The experience of having done something at least once in your life.
It implies temporal distance - not recent. For just-happened, use 〜たばかり.
〜たことがない, with 一度も for emphasis.
Paired-pattern lessons with SRS that includes trap examples.
N4 〜ても / 〜でも: The Even-If Grammar That Quietly Powers Half Of Daily Conversation
The 〜ても family is N4’s quiet workhorse. It powers concession (“even if I’m busy, I’ll come”), permission (“even if it’s late, you can call”), and the entire negotiation register of polite Japanese. The reason most learners fumble it is simple: it conjugates differently for verbs, adjectives, and nouns - and the noun version (でも) collides with the conjunction でも (“but”).
1. The Conjugation Table
| Part of speech | Pattern | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Verbs | V-te + も | 食べても太らない |
| い-adjectives | drop い + くても | 高くても買う |
| な-adjectives | + でも | 静かでも集中できない |
| Nouns | + でも | 雨でも出かける |
| Negative | V-なくても | 行かなくてもいい |
2. The でも Twin Trap
- Sentence-initial でも = “but”: 「でも、私は行きたい。」
- Post-noun でも = “even if”: 「子供でも分かる。」
Position decides meaning. A でも at the start of a clause or sentence is the conjunction. A でも attached to a noun or な-adjective is the concessive particle.
3. Permission: 〜てもいい
Adding いい turns the “even if” into permission: 「ここで写真を撮ってもいいですか」(May I take a photo here?). For a more polite request: 〜てもよろしいですか.
4. Negative Permission: 〜なくてもいい
「来なくてもいいです」 = you don’t have to come. The negative te-form is one of the most useful softeners in Japanese conversation, and 〜なくてもいい is its flagship usage.
5. The Concessive vs Conditional Distinction
〜ても means “even if”; 〜たら means “if/when”. They are not synonyms. 雨が降ったら帰る = if it rains, I’ll go home. 雨が降っても帰らない = even if it rains, I won’t go home.
6. The 5-Sentence Drill
- 高くても買います。
- 子供でも分かるよ。
- 明日来なくてもいいです。
- 雨が降っても試合は行います。
- 分からなくても、聞いてもいいです。
Related Reading on Kanjijo
Frequently Asked Questions
‘Even if’ or ‘even though’.
Verbs te-form + も; い-adj くても; な-adj/noun でも.
Position in the sentence: sentence-initial = ‘but’; post-noun = ‘even if’.
Three-way contrast lessons with SRS trap examples.
〜ながら at N4: Doing Two Things at Once Without Sounding Robotic
If you have ever wanted to say “I study Japanese while listening to music,” ながら is the N4 grammar built for exactly that. The form is easy. The trap is what most learners do not know: the clause after ながら is the main action; the verb before ながら is the secondary one. Confuse them and your sentence quietly says the opposite of what you mean.
1. The Form
Drop ます from a verb’s polite form, add ながら.
| Verb | Masu-stem | +ながら |
|---|---|---|
| 食べる | 食べ | 食べながら |
| 聞く | 聞き | 聞きながら |
| 歩く | 歩き | 歩きながら |
| する | し | しながら |
| 来る | き | 来ながら |
2. The Main-Action Rule
This is the single most important fact about ながら. Many learners assume Japanese parallel grammar treats both verbs equally. It does not.
音楽を聞きながら勉強する。
I study (main) while listening to music (background).
勉強しながら音楽を聞く。
I listen to music (main) while studying (background).
The English translations look interchangeable. The Japanese sentences differ in focus. The first one is about studying. The second is about listening. JLPT loves to test exactly this distinction.
3. Why Same-Subject Is Required
Both actions in a ながら sentence must be performed by the same person. If you need different subjects, swap to 〜間に or 〜とき.
✗ 弟が遊びながら、母が料理する。
✓ 弟が遊んでいる間に、母が料理する。 Mum cooks while my brother plays.
4. Natural Use Cases at N4
歩きながら、スマホを見ないでください。 Please don’t look at your phone while walking.
コーヒーを飲みながら、本を読みます。 I read while drinking coffee.
働きながら、大学に通っています。 I’m attending university while working.
That last sentence reveals an important secondary use: ながら for life-scale parallels, not just moment-to-moment ones. 働きながら大学に通う covers years of activity, not minutes.
5. ながら Cannot Stack Momentary Verbs
One subtle restriction: both actions need to be capable of continuing simultaneously. Punctual verbs (start, finish, arrive) do not fit ながら because they happen in an instant.
✗ 着きながら電話する。 (arrive is punctual)
✓ 着いて電話する。 Arrive and then call.
6. The Contrastive Cousin: ながらも
Adding も to ながら shifts the meaning entirely. ながらも means “although / despite” - a concessive use formally tested at N3-N2 but worth meeting at N4 so the form does not surprise you later.
知っていながらも、黙っていた。 Despite knowing, they stayed silent.
7. Pitfalls Specific to N4 Output
- Reversed focus: Putting the wrong action before ながら so the sentence emphasizes the secondary one.
- Different subjects: Forgetting that ながら locks you into a single subject.
- Punctual verbs: Trying ながら with verbs like 着く, 始まる.
- Forgetting the masu-stem: Saying 食べるながら instead of 食べながら.
8. Listening Targets in Real Japanese
ながら is everywhere in podcast intros, vlogs and J-pop lyrics. Listen for it actively this week. Examples you will hear constantly:
- 歩きながら話す (walking and talking)
- 見ながら作る (cooking while watching a recipe video)
- 泣きながら謝る (apologizing in tears)
- 笑いながら答える (answering with a laugh)
Each of these is a single phonological chunk to your ear after a week of focused exposure.
9. The Daily Drill
Each morning, list three things you do simultaneously and translate them with ながら, paying attention to which action is the main one:
- I commute while listening to a podcast → ポッドキャストを聞きながら通勤する.
- I watch anime while folding laundry → 洗濯物を畳みながらアニメを見る.
- I drink tea while reading email → メールを読みながらお茶を飲む.
Five days of this and ながら becomes muscle memory.
Related Reading on Kanjijo
Frequently Asked Questions
Take the masu-stem and add ながら: 食べながら, 聞きながら.
The clause AFTER ながら. The verb before it is the secondary action.
Only in fixed expressions like 涙ながらに. Verbal use dominates at N4.
The contrastive “although / despite,” tested more at N3-N2.
Yes - same subject required at N4.
JLPT N4 Grammar: Intermediate Patterns
N4 is where Japanese gets interesting. You can express conditions, intentions, ability, and complex ideas. These ~130 patterns bridge the gap between “textbook beginner” and “can actually hold a conversation.”
Verb Forms You Must Know
| Pattern | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| 〜られる (Potential) | Can do | 食べられる (can eat) |
| 〜れる/られる (Passive) | Is done to | 食べられる (is eaten) |
| 〜させる (Causative) | Make/let someone do | 食べさせる (make eat) |
| 〜よう (Volitional) | Let’s / I intend to | 食べよう (let’s eat) |
| 〜ば (Conditional) | If | 食べれば (if you eat) |
| 命令形 (Imperative) | Command | 食べろ！(Eat!) |
Key N4 Grammar Patterns
Conditionals (If/When)
〜たら = If/when (most versatile): 雨が降ったら、家にいます (If it rains, I’ll stay home)
〜ば = If (hypothetical): 安ければ、買います (If it’s cheap, I’ll buy it)
〜と = When (automatic result): ボタンを押すと、ドアが開く (Press the button and the door opens)
〜なら = If (topic-based): 日本に行くなら、京都がいい (If you’re going to Japan, Kyoto is good)
Giving & Receiving
〜てあげる = do for someone: 友達に教えてあげた (I taught my friend)
〜てもらう = have someone do for you: 先生に教えてもらった (I had the teacher teach me)
〜てくれる = someone does for you: 母が作ってくれた (My mother made it for me)
Expressing Intention & Plans
〜つもり = intend to: 来年日本に行くつもりです (I intend to go to Japan next year)
〜予定 = scheduled to: 3時に会議の予定です (Meeting scheduled at 3)
〜ようにする = make an effort to: 毎日勉強するようにしている (I try to study every day)
Quoting & Reporting
〜と言う = say that: 田中さんは来ると言った (Tanaka said he’ll come)
〜と思う = think that: 日本語は面白いと思う (I think Japanese is interesting)
〜そうだ = I heard that: 明日雨だそうだ (I heard it’ll rain tomorrow)
N4 Requires ~300 Kanji
N4 doubles the kanji count from N5. Without solid kanji knowledge, grammar patterns become impossible to read in practice. Kanjijo’s N4 deck covers all 300 kanji with:
- Mnemonic stories for memorable first encounters
- SRS scheduling that adapts to your pace
- Writing practice for deeper retention
- Vocabulary in context showing grammar patterns naturally
Frequently Asked Questions
For most learners it is the four conditionals - と, ば, たら, and なら - because English collapses them all into “if.” They are not interchangeable: と is for automatic results, ば is hypothetical, たら is the flexible all-purpose “when/if,” and なら responds to context. The second hardest is giving-and-receiving (あげる/くれる/もらう), which encodes direction and social perspective that English does not.
N4 adds roughly 130–150 patterns on top of N5, but they organize into about seven core systems: the four conditionals, giving and receiving, the potential form, the volitional, the passive, the causative, and experience/change patterns like ～たことがある and ～ようになる. Master those and the remaining patterns are mostly combinations.
たら is the most flexible conditional - it works for “if” and for “when/after” a one-time future event, and it allows a reaction in the second clause (お金があったら買います). ば is more hypothetical and general, and classically cannot be followed by a request or command with the same subject. When unsure at N4, たら is usually the safe choice.
Anchor them to direction relative to you. あげる is give moving away from your in-group; くれる is give moving toward you; もらう is receive. The key insight is that Japanese chooses the verb by whose side the speaker is on, not just who owns the object - which is why くれる always warms toward the speaker.
Master N4 Grammar with Kanjijo
Kanjijo turns N4’s tricky systems into intuition: the full N4 grammar bank teaches conditionals and perspective forms as contrast sets, the SRS engine reviews each point before you forget, exclusive mnemonics lock in kanji and vocabulary, the OCR scanner decodes real Japanese, and full mock JLPT tests plus reading and listening tracks rehearse exam pressure - all in one calm, zen app.
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