Japanese i-adjective

kitanai — dirty 汚い

Explore the principal positive, negative, past, non-past and conditional forms of this Japanese adjective.

How i-adjectives conjugate

The final changes to create negative, past and connecting forms. The adjective itself carries this grammatical information, so a separate verb is not required in the plain forms.

Conjugation table

The English glosses are approximate; the natural translation depends on the surrounding sentence.

Form Style Positive Negative
Present (non-past) Plain is dirty kitanai 汚い is not dirty kitanakunai 汚くない
Polite kitanai desu 汚いです kitanakunai desu 汚くないです
Past Plain was dirty kitanakatta 汚かった was not dirty kitanakunakatta 汚くなかった
Polite kitanakatta desu 汚かったです kitanakunakatta desu 汚くなかったです
Presumptive Plain will probably be dirty kitanai darō 汚いだろう kitanakunai darō 汚くないだろう
Polite kitanai deshō 汚いでしょう kitanakunai deshō 汚くないでしょう
Conditional Standard if it is dirty kitanakereba 汚ければ if it is not dirty kitanakunakereba 汚くなければ
Connecting form Standard kitanakute 汚くて kitanakunakute 汚くなくて

These conjugations are generated automatically and are intended as a learning guide. Check the natural usage in context when accuracy is important.