Now the Years
Belong to Someone.
A year is a number on a calendar. Age is what happens when those years belong to someone. Japanese can now move from counting time to talking about a life.
How old? The useful version.
歳 means years of age. Ask 何歳ですか when age is relevant; おいくつですか is a softer, more polite alternative.
Mostly regular. Mostly.
Attach 歳 to a number, but listen for sound changes. Japanese likes rhythm enough to modify a few edges.
Age from one to sixty.
Do not memorise every possible age separately. Learn the pattern—and give the exceptions extra attention.
Twenty is はたち.
20歳 has the traditional and very common age reading はたち · hatachi.
For beginner age vocabulary, remember 20歳 = はたち first.
A question becomes personal.
When age is relevant, the exchange itself is simple.
Same grammar. Different social texture.
Asking about a child
A more polite question
A number explains surprisingly little.
Age matters on forms, at schools, for tickets, healthcare and milestones. In ordinary adult conversation, context matters just as much.
Age tells you how many years someone has lived. It tells you remarkably little about what they can still teach you.
Years do not only belong. They arrive.
Japanese uses ～歳になります to say someone will turn a particular age.
Knowing the question is not the same as needing it.
Age questions can be normal when there is a reason—children, school, forms, eligibility, milestones, family conversation, or when age is already the topic. With adults you have just met, it may feel unnecessarily personal.
何歳ですか。
Direct and useful when age is genuinely relevant.
おいくつですか。
Softer and more polite, but politeness does not make every personal question necessary.
How old do I look?
You may hear this among friends or in light conversation:
Notice age without reducing people to it.
Listen for 歳 in family conversations, interviews, television, forms and introductions where age is relevant. Try to catch the number before it.
1歳
issai
8歳
hassai
20歳
hatachi
Life keeps moving
while we count.
We count age because years pass. Life, rather inconveniently and beautifully, keeps moving while we count.