Quick Reference

Meaning & Definition

来る (kuru) is one of only two fully irregular verbs in Japanese — a distinction that sets it apart from the very first day of study. Unlike regular verbs that follow predictable patterns, kuru changes its entire stem depending on how it is conjugated, making it both a beginner’s stumbling block and a foundational word that appears in hundreds of everyday phrases.

来る means to move toward the speaker’s location — the opposite direction of 行く (iku, to go). The critical distinction is perspective: if you are at home and a friend is heading to your place, you say 来る from your point of view; your friend would say 行く from theirs. This speaker-anchored directionality carries into all tenses and polite forms.

Beyond simple movement, 来る functions as an auxiliary verb in the 〜て来る pattern. Attached to another verb, it adds the nuance of performing an action and then returning, or of a change gradually coming toward the present moment — for example, 食べて来る (to go eat and come back) or 変わってきた (things have been gradually changing up to now). This auxiliary use is extremely common in spoken and written Japanese alike.

Conjugation is where learners must pay close attention. 来る is a カ行変格 (ka-gyō henkaku) verb — its stem shifts unpredictably: plain form 来る, past 来た (kita), te-form 来て (kite), negative 来ない (konai), volitional 来よう (koyō), and conditional 来れば (kureba). The vowel changes from /ku/ to /ki/ to /ko/ depending on the suffix, a pattern found in no other verb.

How to Use It

The single biggest error English speakers make with 来る is choosing it based on physical distance rather than whose location is the reference point. Remember: 来る always means movement toward where the speaker (or listener) currently is. If your teacher asks whether you are coming to class, she uses 来る because class is her location; you, planning to go there, would normally say 行く.

For the 〜て来る auxiliary, pay attention to whether the action flows toward the present or back toward the speaker. 買って来て (please go buy it and bring it back) implies a round trip ending at the speaker’s location, whereas 買って行く implies carrying the purchase away.

In formal contexts, 来る is replaced entirely by different words depending on social role: いらっしゃる (honorific, for superiors coming) and 参る (mairu, humble, for yourself coming). Using 来る to describe a client’s arrival would sound blunt in a business email — いらっしゃいます is expected.

Kanji Breakdown

来 is composed of the pictograph of a wheat stalk (木) with grain clusters on both sides, originally representing an agricultural plant brought to Japan from the continent. Over time the character was repurposed phonetically to mean ‘arrival’ or ‘coming,’ reflecting the idea of something traveling from a distant origin and reaching here. The same character appears in words like 来年 (rainen, next year) and 外来語 (gairaigo, loanwords — literally ‘words that came from outside’).

Example Sentences

Cultural Context

The phrase おいでになる — a highly formal synonym of 来る — illustrates how deeply Japanese encodes social relationships into movement verbs. In traditional settings such as tea ceremony or formal business hospitality, hosts never simply say 来てください (please come); they use お越しください or いらしてください, layering respect into the very act of asking someone to move toward them. 来る in its plain form thus carries an implicit social register that learners need to calibrate from an early stage.

来る also anchors several fixed expressions that confuse learners encountering them out of context. 出来る (dekiru, to be able to / to be completed) is etymologically 出 + 来る (to come out), though modern speakers rarely parse it that way. Similarly, the greeting いらっしゃいませ heard in every shop is the honorific imperative of いらっしゃる, itself a polite substitute for 来る. Recognizing these connections helps learners see 来る not as an isolated irregular verb but as a root threading through much of everyday Japanese.

📚 Learn More