Japanese onomatopoeia

Japanese is famously rich in onomatopoeia — words that paint sounds, feelings, and textures directly into speech. Rain doesn't just fall, it pours ザーザー; a nervous heart goes ドキドキ. You will meet these words everywhere: everyday conversation, manga, advertising, and the corners of the language people call untranslatable.

Linguists split them into two broad kinds. 擬音語 (giongo) imitate actual sounds — ワンワン for a dog's bark, ゴロゴロ for rumbling thunder. 擬態語 (gitaigo) mimic states and manners that make no sound at all — こっそり (stealthily), ふわふわ (soft and fluffy). Sound-imitating words tend to be written in katakana and state-describing words in hiragana, though real usage mixes freely.

Grammatically most work as adverbs, often followed by と before a verb (ドキドキと待つ — to wait with a pounding heart), and many pair with する to act as verbs: ドキドキする means to be nervous or excited. The list below is every word tagged as onomatopoeic or mimetic in the dictionary — sort it, narrow it by JLPT level or part of speech, or start with the classics.