How to Add or Show Furigana for Japanese Text
Is there a non-AI software that can add or show furigana to Japanese text automatically and accurately, and can be run on your computer?
There are several non-AI, reliable software options for adding or viewing furigana on your computer. These typically use morphological analyzers (like MeCab or Kuromoji) combined with comprehensive dictionaries rather than generative AI models.
Editing Documents
If you already have Microsoft Office installed on your PC or Mac, you can enter furigana text in them.
Microsoft Word
Select your text and then go to the “Home” tab, and click the “Phonetic Guide” button (usually next to the “Clear All Formatting” or “Change Case” buttons). The icon may be shown differently depending on your OS and system language. In the English interface it’s shown as an “A” with a tiny “abc” above it.
The “Phonetic Guide” window will appear, where you can enter the furigana (or called “Ruby Text” more generally) for each character.
For efficiency, you can get it done faster if you enable the Authoring and Proofing Tools for East Asian languages.
- Go to Preferences (=CMD-,=) > Authoring and Proofing Tools > East Asian Languages.
- Select Japanese in the “Select a Language” menu.
- Restart Word.
Now when you select a base word and click “Phonetic Guide” the “Ruby text” column should be pre-filled with the readings, and you can apply it to all occurrences of the same word.
Microsoft Excel
Unlike Word, the “Phonetic Guide” button is hidden if you haven’t enabled it explicitly. To enable:
- Go to Preferences (=CMD-,=) > Authoring > East Asian Languages.
- Select Japanese in the “Select a Language” menu.
- Restart Excel.
Then you can enter furigana in each cell. You can toggle the display of furigana on and off.
See Use furigana (phonetic guides) with Japanese text.
Furigana PDF (macOS/iOS)
If you deal with PDF documents frequently, Furigana PDF by telethon k.k. is a highly-rated desktop/mobile utility.
- It processes entire PDF files and injects ruby characters (furigana) into the document.
- It works entirely offline and doesn’t send data to a server.
Reading Web/Local HTML (Browser Extensions)
For reading Japanese text on the web or locally via a browser, these are the gold standard.
Furigana Converter
Furigana Converter is a tool for you to add furigana to Japanese text automatically on the fly. Click here to start using it!
See the official documentation for more details.
Furiganator
Inserts Furigana (Ruby text) in Hiragana, Katakana or Romaji in the webpage. Perfect companion for Japanese reading practice.
- Very fast and reliable.
- Furigana in Hiragana, Katakana or Romaji.
- Option to show Furigana only on mouse over.
- Option to make the furigana text unselectable.
- Option to use color-tags to easily identify the kanji level or grade.
- Multiple color themes.
It works in Chrome, Edge (Install it from Chrome Web Store).
Yomitan
Webiste: https://yomitan.wiki/
Successor to Yomichan, it is a powerful, offline-capable dictionary. Once you import dictionaries (like JMdict), you can hover over any word to see the furigana and definition instantly.
10ten Japanese Reader
A lighter alternative to Yomitan. It is very fast and provides clean pop-ups with readings and meanings without needing a heavy setup.
Batch Processing Files (For Developers)
Anki with “Japanese Support” Add-on
If your goal is to study the text later, the Japanese Support add-on for Anki is the most efficient desktop tool for bulk generation.
- When you paste text into a “Source” field, it automatically generates the furigana in a “Reading” field using a local dictionary.
- It uses a specific syntax:
漢字[かんじ].
Kuroshiro
Japanese language library for converting Japanese sentence to Hiragana, Katakana or Romaji with furigana and okurigana modes supported.
MeCab
It is a fast, C++ based morphological analyzer. You can pipe any Japanese text into it, and it will output the base forms, parts of speech, and the readings (furigana).
How to use:
You can install it via Homebrew (brew install mecab) on Mac or use a pre-compiled binary for Windows. There are wrappers for Java, Python, and Node.js if you want to build a custom local script to “furiganize” your files.
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