How to say “My Japanese is bad” / 上手 下手 vs. 得意 苦手

In this lesson, you will learn various expressions to say e.g. ‘Your English is good!’, ‘My Japanese is bad / isn’t very good’, i.e. describing an ability.

The first set of adjectives that usually comes to mind for many beginners would probably be いい ii (good) and 悪わるい warui (bad) to describe their proficiency or ability.

For example,

× わたしの日に本ほん語ごは悪わるいです。 <form.> watashi no nihon-go wa warui desu. 

My Japanese is bad.

Note:

Even though many Japanese in this case might be able to understand what you’re trying to bring across, but it is definitely not how a native speaker would say i.e. not a natural way of speech.

Instead, you use the adjective 上じょう手ず(な) jyouzu (na) to mean ‘to be good / skilled’ in something.

上じょう手ず(な) jyouzu (na) = to be good at / skilled

Note:

In informal speech, if you want to attach ね ne at the end of the sentence, you must include だ da if the preceding word is a NOUN or NA-adjective.

NOUN / NA-ADJ + だ da + ね ne <inf.>

I-ADJ + ね ne <inf.>

It’s ~, isn’t it?

Note:

However, this particular expression (上じょう手ず jyouzu) can only be used if you are complimenting another person. Grammatically, you will not be wrong if you were to use it to describe your own ability.

Reason being, in the Japanese culture, Japanese believes in being humble, 謙けん遜そんする kenson suru (to be humble). As such even if you are really good in something, you will not use such an expression to describe yourself.

That being said, it would be perfectly acceptable if you were to use it in a negative way on yourself i.e. not very good.

~not~

NOUN / NA-ADJ じゃない ja-nai <inf.>

NOUN / NA-ADJ じゃないです ja-nai desu/ じゃありません ja-arimasen <form.>

~not very / really~

あんまり anmari + NEGATION (ない nai) <inf.>

あまり amari + NEGATION (ないです nai desu / ません masen) <form.>

Note:

Always remember to negate the verb that follows あんまりanmari / あまりamari (otherwise it will not make sense at all).

Moving on, if you want to say your ability (e.g. in Japanese) is completely hopeless i.e. bad,

下手へた(な) heta (na) = to be bad at

Apart from the examples given above, other than using these adjectives to describe the proficiency of a language, you can also use it to describe a person’s ability.

上じょう手ず(な) jyouzu (na) = to be good at / skilled

Alternatively, you can also include the specific action, i.e. the drawing (of a picture; noun), in the sentence.

Note:

VERB + の no = VERB–ing (noun)

But in this case, if the context is clear, the verb is generally omitted.

Similarly, if you are bad / poor at something,

下手へた(な) heta (na) = to be bad at

Sentence breakdown

字じ ji (word, handwriting in this case)

Note:

Above expressions will not be applicable if you want to describe the ability in e.g. an academic subject, good or bad in Mathematics. In this case, you will sound like you ‘came up’ with Mathematics and you are good / bad at it.

As such, let’s learn the following adjectives to fit this application.

得意とくい(な) tokui (na) (to be confident in ~ i.e. good in ~)

On the contrary, if you want to say that you are not good / not confident in something,

苦手(な) nigate (na) (to be bad at~; because you don’t like it / not confident in)

Note:

The essence for the usage of 苦にが手て(な) nigate (na) is that you’re bad at something because you are not confident in or dislike it, or vice versa.

Note:

Using 苦にが手てwill be less direct, especially when answering to a question by another person.

With the various differences explained (between 上じょう手ず / 下手へた and 得意とくい / 苦にが手て), I hope that you now have a clearer understanding and will be able to differentiate to use these words in the correct context in the day-to-day application.