Japanese listening practice, from slow to fast

401 short scenes of real spoken Japanese, sorted by how fast the comedians talk. Start with the slow ones. Every scene has the full transcript, a translation of each line, and a “Slower” button that plays at 75% speed.

Comedians in these scenes speak at a median of 7.3 characters per second; the middle 80% speak between 5.3 and 9.2.

Measured on our transcripts: Japanese characters (kana and kanji, without punctuation) per second of speech in each scene. Comedy runs faster than most everyday conversation, so the slow scenes are the place to start.

How to practice

Watch the scene once for the joke, without reading.
Play the target line again with “This line”, then with “Slower”.
Open the full script, read along, and say the line with the comedian.
When the slow scenes feel easy, move on to the normal and fast ones.

Slow 54

Normal 176

Fast 171

Quick answers

How fast do Japanese people speak?

In 401 comedy scenes on Ukeru, the median speed is 7.3 Japanese characters per second, and most speakers fall between 5.3 and 9.2. Comedy is faster than most everyday conversation.

Is watching Japanese comedy good listening practice?

Yes, if you start slow. Comedy uses the casual Japanese people really speak, at natural speed, and the audience’s laugh tells you where the important line was. Start with the slow scenes and replay single lines.

Can I slow down the audio?

Yes. Every scene has a “Slower” button that plays at 75% speed, and you can replay any single line by tapping it in the transcript.

Everyday Japanese, ranked →