LESSON NOTES · レッスンノート

N4How you sound · Sep 12, 2026

Keigo vs casual: how to know when to switch in Japanese

Japanese politeness has three separate tools above plain speech — teineigo (polite), sonkeigo (raises someone else's action), and kenjougo (lowers your own) — and which one you need depends on whose action you're describing, not how formal the room feels.

Our post on だ vs です covers the first switch: plain speech versus the polite です/ます form. That gets you through most conversations. Keigo (敬語けいご) is what sits above それ — a second, sharper layer that native speakers reach for with teachers, customers, and anyone clearly senior to them. It looks like one intimidating system from the outside. It is actually three small systems with three different jobs.

The basics

What is keigo, and why is it three things instead of one?

Keigo is the umbrella term for "respectful language," but it splits into three tools that do different work:

  • 丁寧語ていねいご (teineigo) — polite language. Raises the formality of the sentence. This is です/ます.
  • 尊敬語そんけいご (sonkeigo) — respectful language. Raises the other person's action.
  • 謙譲語けんじょうご (kenjougo) — humble language. Lowers your own action, which indirectly raises theirs.

The confusion almost always comes from treating these as one dial you turn up. They're not a dial — they're a question: whose action is this sentence describing? Yours, or someone you're showing respect to?

先生せんせいます。 — The teacher is coming. (teineigo only — polite, but plain about who's doing it) 先生せんせいがいらっしゃいます。 — The teacher is coming. (sonkeigo — the teacher's action is raised)

Same fact, same teacher, two different levels of respect for the same verb — because 尊敬語そんけいご isn't about the sentence's formality, it's about whose feet are moving.

How does sonkeigo actually work?

Sonkeigo (尊敬語そんけいご) is what you use for the actions of someone above you — a teacher, a customer, your boss, a stranger you're being polite to. Some common verbs have a completely separate respectful form instead of a regular conjugation:

いらっしゃる — to go / come / be (respectful form of く・る・いる) おっしゃる — to say (respectful form of う) がる — to eat / drink (respectful form of べる・む) らんになる — to see / look (respectful form of る)

For verbs without a special form, the pattern is お + verb stem + になる:

先生せんせいがおみになったほんです。 — This is the book the teacher read. (sonkeigo — お + み + になる)

The rule that trips people up: you never use sonkeigo for your own actions. Saying おっしゃいました about something you said yourself is a genuine, noticeable error — like accidentally bowing to yourself.

How does kenjougo actually work?

Kenjougo (謙譲語けんじょうご) is the mirror image: it lowers your own action to make the other person's position look relatively higher. You use it when talking about what you do for or to someone you respect.

まいります。 — I'll go / come. (humble form of く・る) もうします。 — I say / my name is. (humble form of う, used for self-introduction) いたします。 — I'll do. (humble form of する) うかがいます。 — I'll ask / visit. (humble form of く・たずねる, used toward someone senior)

明日あした、そちらにうかがいます。 — I'll visit you there tomorrow. (kenjougo — lowers "I visit" toward a senior listener)

Notice the logic: うかがいます isn't polite about the visit itself, it's polite about the fact that you're the one doing the visiting, to them. Swap the direction and it stops making sense — you would never use うかがいます to describe your boss visiting your house.

When do people actually switch from keigo to casual (タメくち)?

Not on a timer, and not just because two people have talked a few times. The switch usually needs one of these:

  • A clear gap closes. A coworker becomes a friend, a classmate becomes a close one.
  • An explicit invitation. Someone senior says タメくちでいいよ ("casual is fine") — until they do, staying polite is the safe assumption.
  • Context resets it. The same two people might use keigo at work and casual speech at an after-work bar, switching back the next morning without comment.

タメくちでいいよ。 — Casual is fine, you don't have to be so formal. (casual, an invitation from someone senior to relax the register)

Age alone doesn't grant permission — a senpai one year older at a part-time job might still get です/ます from a younger coworker for months. What changes it is relationship, not clock time.

Beyond the basics

Why do anime characters suddenly drop into casual speech mid-scene?

This is one of the most useful tells in anime dialogue, and it's built on exactly the mechanic above. A character who has been careful and polite all episode — です/ます, maybe even sonkeigo toward a superior — drops every honorific the instant they're overwhelmed: furious, terrified, or suddenly, deeply sincere.

The drop reads as "the mask came off." It works precisely because keigo is a performed social distance, and dropping it mid-sentence signals that the performance just broke. A villain who has spoken in immaculate keigo the whole fight switching to plain, blunt speech right before the final blow is a very deliberate writing choice, not a slip.

まえ、いい加減かげんにしろよ。 — That's it, cut it out. (very casual/rough — a register shift used for a character finally snapping)

If you notice a character do this, it's worth rewinding — the moment they drop keigo usually marks the emotional turning point of the scene.

Does keigo mean the same thing as "being cold" or "distant"?

Not necessarily — and this trips up a lot of learners. In Japanese customer service, hospitality, and formal correspondence, dense keigo is warmth expressed through care, not coldness. A shopkeeper using layered sonkeigo and kenjougo toward a customer isn't being standoffish; they're performing hospitality (おもてなし) at a high level. The emotional read depends entirely on context — the same density of keigo toward a friend would feel like a wall going up, while toward a stranger at a hotel front desk it reads as excellent service.

What about the honorifics attached to names — do they fit into this system?

They're related but separate. San, kun, chan, and sama attach to names, while keigo changes the verbs and grammar of the sentence. You can combine both: 田中たなかさまがいらっしゃいました uses the honorific さま on the name and sonkeigo on the verb, stacking two different respect systems in one sentence. For the name-honorific side specifically, see our guide to san, kun, chan, and sama.

Common mistakes

  • Using sonkeigo for yourself.みになりました about your own reading is backwards — sonkeigo is reserved for other people's actions, never your own.
  • Mixing kenjougo into a sentence about someone senior's action. うかがいました should describe your visit, not theirs — for their visit, you need sonkeigo (いらっしゃいました), not kenjougo.
  • Assuming keigo is just です/ます, louder. Reaching only for teineigo and never sonkeigo/kenjougo when the situation calls for it (a job interview, addressing a teacher's parent, formal customer service) reads as underdressed, not wrong exactly, but noticeably plain.
  • Switching to casual without an invitation. Dropping keigo before someone senior signals it's okay can land as presumptuous, even if your grammar is otherwise perfect.

The four-level ladder

Level Job Example (the verb く "to go")
尊敬語そんけいご (sonkeigo) Raises someone else's action いらっしゃる
丁寧語ていねいご (teineigo) Raises the formality of the sentence きます
謙譲語けんじょうご (kenjougo) Lowers your own action まいります
普通ふつうからだ (plain / タメくち) No distance at all

Practice

Answers are hidden — build yours first, then open. Questions 2 and 3 are a pair: the same teacher, and who gets raised decides the verb.

1. What are the three parts of keigo?

Show answer

Teineigo (polite), sonkeigo (respectful), kenjougo (humble) — teineigo is the です/ます layer; the other two move people up or down relative to each other.

2. Say "the teacher is coming," politely but with no honorific verb.

Show answer

先生せんせいます — teineigo only. Polite, but plain about the action itself.

3. Now raise the teacher's action.

Show answer

先生せんせいがいらっしゃいます — sonkeigo. This is the pair to question 2: the politeness level did not change, the person being raised did.

4. Which is the humble verb for く and る, and when do you use it?

Show answer

まいります — for your own movement, toward someone senior — kenjougo lowers you rather than raising them.

5. Introduce yourself using the humble verb for う.

Show answer

〜ともうします — the standard self-introduction. もうす is the humble form of う.

6. Something is wrong here: 先生せんせいまいります。

Show answer

先生せんせいがいらっしゃいますまいる lowers the subject, so using it for the teacher demotes them. Humble forms are for you and your side only.

7. Someone senior says タメくちでいいよ. What just happened?

Show answer

They invited you to drop the polite register — the switch is theirs to offer, not yours to take.

8. Say "I'll visit you there tomorrow," humbly.

Show answer

明日あした、そちらにうかがいますうかがう is the humble form for visiting or asking.

9. Why does an anime character suddenly switch to rough speech mid-scene?

Show answer

The register shift is the drama — dropping politeness signals that the relationship, or the character's patience, has just changed.

10. Which honorific verb means "to eat," and who does it apply to?

Show answer

がる — the other person — it raises their action. For yourself, you would stay plain or use いただく.

FAQ

Do I need sonkeigo and kenjougo as a beginner? Not urgently. です/ます (teineigo) will carry you through nearly every learner-level situation safely. Sonkeigo and kenjougo matter more as you advance into workplace Japanese, job interviews, or formal customer-facing contexts.

Is it rude to use teineigo with a close friend? It's not rude exactly, but it reads as odd or distant — like suddenly saying "I would appreciate it if you could" to your roommate. Among close friends, plain form is the expected register.

How do I know if someone wants me to switch to casual speech? Wait for a clear signal — they use casual speech with you first, or say something like タメくちでいいよ. Switching first, especially with someone older or senior to you, is the riskier move.

Are sonkeigo and kenjougo used in casual conversation at all? Rarely between friends, but you'll hear kenjougo phrases like いたします or うかがいます used casually in service industries, even toward customers who are themselves speaking politely but not formally.

What happens if I mix up sonkeigo and kenjougo? Native speakers will usually still understand you, but it's one of the more noticeable errors — like using "may I" when you meant "might you." It's worth learning the direction (self vs. other) rather than memorizing verbs as an unordered list.

Is keigo the same in every region of Japan? The core system (teineigo, sonkeigo, kenjougo) is standard nationwide, though Kansai and other regions have their own additional polite forms layered on top of local dialect — a separate topic from what's covered here.

Vocabulary from this article

Tap the block to select all of it, then copy. In Anki: File → Import, note type Basic, separator Tab — the first column becomes the front, the second the back.

先生	せんせい — teacher
来る	くる — to come
行く	いく — to go
言う	いう — to say
食べる	たべる — to eat
飲む	のむ — to drink
見る	みる — to see
読む	よむ — to read
本	ほん — book
明日	あした — tomorrow
聞く	きく — to ask, to hear
参る	まいる — to go/come (humble)
申す	もうす — to say (humble)
伺う	うかがう — to ask, to visit (humble)
召し上がる	めしあがる — to eat (respectful)
覧	らん — look (in ご覧になる)
加減	かげん — degree, moderation

I'm Yuuki, a Japanese teacher based in Tokyo. I've taught on italki as a Top 1% teacher and watched over 1,500 anime, and keigo is consistently the point where students go from "I can hold a conversation" to "I sound like I actually work here" — it's worth the discomfort of the first few weeks.

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Sources: the author's own lessons and standard reference grammars.

More drills like the ones above, plus a timed JLPT-style mock test: Practice · N4

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