短い（みじかい、mijikai）
- short

The Japanese word 短い (みじかい) means "short" or "brief" in English. It describes something that has a small length, duration, or extent. It can be used to describe physical objects, time, or abstract concepts. It is an adjective. 短い can describe the length of an object from one end to the other, the duration of an event, or a summary or brief account of something.

⚫︎髪が短い Translation: My hair is short. ⚫︎短い時間で終わった Translation: It finished in a short amount of time. ⚫︎短い手紙を書いた Translation: I wrote a short letter.

⚫︎You use 短い when you want to describe something as being not long in length, time, or duration. ⚫︎It is used to modify nouns, similar to the word "short" in English. ⚫︎It can be used in various contexts, such as describing a person's height, the duration of a movie, or the length of a road.

⚫︎The word 短い is written in kanji as 短い. ⚫︎The reading is みじかい in hiragana. ⚫︎There are no other common ways to write this word. ⚫︎The okurigana (送りがな, the hiragana attached to the kanji) is "い" (i) which is a must to conjugate the adjective.

⚫︎短い has several synonyms depending on the context: ⚫︎短い can be similar to 少ない (すくない, few/little) when referring to quantity of time. ⚫︎簡潔な (かんけつな, concise) when referring to being brief or succinct. ⚫︎手短な (てみじかな, brief/short)

⚫︎The antonym of 短い (short) is 長い (ながい), meaning "long."

この道は短いです。 ・Translation: This road is short. ・Explanation: This sentence uses 短い to describe the length of a road.

映画は短いので、すぐ終わりました。 ・Translation: The movie was short, so it ended quickly. ・Explanation: This sentence uses 短い to describe the duration of a movie.

The etymology of 短い is not known.