Translation guide
The English word 'burning' can describe literal fire, intense heat, strong emotions, or urgent sensations. This guide helps learners choose natural Japanese expressions for each meaning.
Describing something that is actively burning with flames.
The most common and neutral way to say something is burning. It's the progressive form of 燃える (to burn).
The house is burning.
The campfire is still burning.
A more technical or formal term for combustion or burning. Often used in scientific or official contexts.
This substance is burning at a high temperature.
Means 'going up in flames' or 'in flames'. Often used for buildings or vehicles engulfed in fire, or metaphorically for online backlash.
The car is burning fiercely.
Describing intense heat, like the sun or a hot object, not necessarily with flames.
Literally 'as if searing', used for scorching heat, especially from the sun.
The sunlight is burning hot.
Means 'scorching' or 'blazing', often used for extreme heat like a desert or a furnace.
A simile meaning 'hot enough to burn'. Can be used for objects or sensations.
Describing intense feelings like love, desire, or ambition.
A common metaphor for burning passion or emotion. Often used with 恋 (love), 思い (feelings), etc.
She fell in burning love.
Means 'hot' but often used for passionate feelings, like 熱い思い (passionate feelings).
Means 'intense' or 'violent', and can describe burning emotions like anger or desire.
Describing a sharp, burning physical sensation, like pain or thirst.
Used for a burning sensation, especially pain. 焼ける means 'to be burned/scorched'.
A burning pain shot through me.
An onomatopoeic word for a stinging or burning pain, like from a sunburn or spicy food.
My skin is burning from the sunburn.
Literary expression for a burning thirst.
Used figuratively to mean urgent or highly important.
English uses 'burning' in many figurative ways. In Japanese, direct translations like 燃えている often only work for literal fire. For emotions or sensations, use the specific expressions provided.
burning love
燃える (moeru) is intransitive, meaning something burns by itself. 焼ける (yakeru) is also intransitive but implies being burned by an external heat source, like food being cooked or skin being sunburned. For 'burning' as an adjective, 燃えるような is for active flames/passion, while 焼けるような is for scorching heat/pain.
The house burns.
The bread is baked/burned.
Work under the burning sun.
The sand is burning hot.
彼は熱い情熱を持っている。
He has a burning passion.
激しい怒りが込み上げた。
A burning anger welled up.
I felt a burning thirst in the desert.