減る To Decrease

Meaning

Primary

To Decrease

Alternatives

To Be Decreased, To Get Decreased

Word Type

intransitive verb, godan verb

Explanation

This word consists of kanji with hiragana attached. Because the hiragana ends with an う sound, you know this word is a verb. The kanji itself means decrease so the verb vocab version is to decrease or to be decreased.

Note that this word is intransitive, so you're not actively decreasing or reducing something here — it's just decreasing, either on its own or as the natural outcome of some process or action.

Reading

へる

Explanation

Since this word consists of a kanji with hiragana attached, you can bet that it will use the kun'yomi reading. You didn't learn that reading with this kanji, so here's a mnemonic to help you:

Everything around you is starting to decrease, so you just nervously chuckle "heh (へ)…" First, you notice your salary has decreased. "Heh… Payroll must've made a mistake this month." Then, you see your bank balance has decreased too. "Heh… Probably just a system error… Heh…" Finally, you watch the value of your stocks decrease at an alarming rate. "Heh… They'll go back up… Right? Heh… Heheh…"

Context

Common Word Combinations

• 〜が減る

  数が減る

  the number decreases, the number goes down

  人口が減る

  the population decreases

  体重が減る

  one's body weight decreases, one loses weight

  リスクが減る

  the risk decreases, the risk is reduced

Context Sentences

エクササイズすると、ウツになるリスクも減るんだって！

They say that when you exercise, your risk for depression decreases too!

ウルトラプロセスフードを食べないようにしたら、十日で体重がニキロ減りました。

When I stopped eating ultra-processed food, I lost two kilograms of weight in ten days.

イライラしやすい人は「他人にギブしすぎ」なんだよ。最初から何もしないか、相手が返せる分だけギブするようにするか、相手に期待しないようにすると、ストレスが劇的に減るよ。

People who are easily frustrated are "giving too much to others." If you either do nothing from the beginning, give only what they can give back, or stop expecting anything in return, your stress will decrease dramatically.

Kanji Composition

1. 減

   げん Decrease