How to Say “Ghost” in Japanese: Spooky Japanese Ghost Stories

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What is the best way to say “ghost” in Japanese? The closest everyday answer is 幽霊（ゆうれい, yūrei）: the spirit or apparition of someone who has died.

Japanese has several nearby words, though, and they are not interchangeable. A yōkai is not simply another word for ghost, and an oni is a more specific kind of supernatural being. Getting those categories straight makes Japanese ghost stories much easier to follow.

Let’s start with the language, then meet some of the best-known figures from Japanese folklore and horror.

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How to Say “Ghost” in Japanese

幽霊（ゆうれい, yūrei） is the closest general translation of “ghost”: the apparition or spirit of a dead person. The word has two long vowels, so yūrei is more precise than yurei.

These related terms help you be more specific:

• 祖霊（それい, sorei）: an ancestral spirit.
• 怨霊（おんりょう, onryō）: a wrathful or vengeful spirit of someone who died.
• 亡霊（ぼうれい, bōrei）: a departed spirit or ghost.
• 騒霊（そうれい, sōrei）: a poltergeist, literally a “noisy spirit”. Notice that its long vowel distinguishes it from sorei.
• 死霊（しりょう, shiryō）: the spirit of a dead person.
• 妖怪（ようかい, yōkai）: a broad category of supernatural beings, creatures and phenomena.
• 鬼（おに, oni）: an ogre-like or demon-like figure in Japanese folklore. Oni are a particular category, not a general word for every ghost or demon.
• 化け物（ばけもの, bakemono） and お化け（おばけ, obake）: transformed or monstrous apparitions. In casual speech, obake can also mean “ghost”.
• 怪談（かいだん, kaidan）: a strange or supernatural tale, especially a ghost story.
• ホラー（horā）: “horror”, as in the horror genre.

The boundaries can overlap in stories, but the central distinction is useful: a yūrei is a dead person’s spirit, yōkai is the wider supernatural category, and oni names one recognisable kind of folkloric being.

Spooky Japanese Vocabulary to Know

Here is some vocabulary for talking about frightening stories, bodies and monsters.

Ways to describe fear and disgust:

• 怖い（こわい, kowai）: scary or frightening; it can also describe feeling afraid.
• おっかない（okkanai）: scary or frightening, in colloquial speech.
• 恐ろしい（おそろしい, osoroshii）: frightening or terrible.
• 恐怖（きょうふ, kyōfu）: fear or terror.
• 恐れる（おそれる, osoreru）: to fear.
• ぞっとする（zotto suru）: to shudder or get chills.
• グロい（guroi）: grotesque or gory, in slang.
• 不気味（ぶきみ, bukimi）: eerie or ominous.
• 気持ち悪い（きもちわるい, kimochi warui）: unpleasant, gross or creepy.

Body vocabulary:

• 骨（ほね, hone）: bone.
• 骨格（こっかく, kokkaku）: skeleton or skeletal structure.
• 血液（けつえき, ketsueki）: blood.
• 頭（あたま, atama）: head.
• 首（くび, kubi）: neck.
• 手（て, te）: hand.
• 腕（うで, ude）: arm.
• 足（あし, ashi）: foot or leg.
• 指（ゆび, yubi）: finger or digit.
• 足の指（あしのゆび, ashi no yubi）: toe.

Supernatural creatures and horror:

• 超自然（ちょうしぜん, chōshizen）: the supernatural.
• 変化（へんげ, henge）: transformation or shape-shifting in a Buddhist or folkloric context. The same spelling is normally read henka when it simply means “change”.
• 怪獣（かいじゅう, kaijū）: a giant monster. Godzilla is often called a 大怪獣（だいかいじゅう, daikaijū）, a great or enormous monster.
• 魔女（まじょ, majo）: witch.
• 吸血鬼（きゅうけつき, kyūketsuki）: vampire.
• 殺し（ころし, koroshi）: killing or murder.
• ゴア（goa）: gore, as a genre term.
• 流血（りゅうけつ, ryūketsu）: bloodshed.

Halloween has become popular in Japan, particularly through costume events and parties in larger cities. Door-to-door trick-or-treating is not the main nationwide custom, although organised children’s events do take place.

Ghosts, Death and the Afterlife in Japanese Culture

There is no single Japanese view of ghosts or the afterlife. Shinto and Buddhist customs often overlap, local traditions differ, and individual beliefs vary.

In the Kojiki, 黄泉の国（よみのくに, Yomi no Kuni） is a mythic land of the dead. You may also hear あの世（ano yo）, an everyday expression for “the other world” or the afterlife, and 地獄（じごく, jigoku）, the Buddhist hell realms. These terms come from different contexts, so they should not be folded into one tidy map of the afterlife.

Some real places are traditionally associated with the boundary between worlds. Yomotsu Hirasaka in Shimane is linked with the entrance to Yomi in myth, while Mount Osore in Aomori has a long cultural association with the dead and the other world. That does not make either place a literal, universally accepted location of the afterlife.

During お盆（おぼん, Obon）, families welcome and honour ancestral spirits through customs such as offerings and grave visits. Dates vary by region, with observances commonly held in July or August. Floating lanterns are part of the tradition in some places, rather than a rule everywhere in Japan.

Japanese Ghost Stories and Supernatural Folklore

Japanese supernatural stories move between theatre, oral tradition, literature and modern urban legends. Our wider guide to Japanese folklore introduces even more creatures and traditions.

For another quick tour, have a look at this post from our @languagehacking Instagram account:

Yotsuya Kaidan: A Famous Tale of Haunting and Revenge

東海道四谷怪談（とうかいどうよつやかいだん, Tōkaidō Yotsuya Kaidan） is an 1825 kabuki play by Tsuruya Nanboku IV. Iemon betrays his wife, Oiwa, and poison disfigures her. After her death, she returns as a vengeful ghost and haunts him.

The plot has changed across stage and screen adaptations, but Oiwa remains one of Japan’s most recognisable onryō.

Baku: The Nightmare Eater

The 獏（ばく, baku） is a dream-eating creature often pictured as a chimera. The real animal called the tapir shares its Japanese name, but the folkloric baku is not simply a tapir.

In a common version of the tradition, a person who wakes from a nightmare asks the baku to eat the bad dream. Some tellings add a warning: if it is still hungry, it may consume more than the nightmare.

Banchō Sarayashiki: The Ghost Who Counts Plates

番町皿屋敷（ばんちょうさらやしき, Banchō Sarayashiki） has several versions. At its centre is Okiku, a servant connected with a set of ten valuable plates. After she is killed and thrown into a well, her ghost can be heard counting the plates and stopping at nine.

The details of who broke or hid the missing plate, and why, depend on the telling. The counting ghost and the well are the story’s enduring core.

Zashiki-warashi: The Parlour Child

座敷童子（ざしきわらし, zashiki-warashi） are childlike yōkai especially associated with Iwate and the wider Tōhoku region. They are said to live in homes, play tricks and bring good fortune to the households they favour.

In some stories, a family’s fortunes decline when its zashiki-warashi leaves. That makes this figure very different from a frightening yūrei.

Shirime: The Yōkai with an Eye in an Unexpected Place

尻目（しりめ, shirime） is a bizarre yōkai said to have no facial features and a large eye in its buttocks. It surprises travellers at night, but it is generally described as frightening rather than harmful.

Kuchisake-onna: A Modern Urban Legend

口裂け女（くちさけおんな, kuchisake-onna）, the “slit-mouthed woman”, is a modern urban-legend figure rather than a straightforward yūrei. She appears wearing a mask and asks, 私、きれい？（Watashi, kirei?）, “Am I pretty?”

She then reveals her cut mouth and asks, これでも？（Kore demo?）, “Even like this?” The outcome, the weapon she carries and the tricks for escaping her all vary from one version to another.

Mimi-nashi Hōichi: The Haunted Musician

In the tale of 耳なし芳一（みみなしほういち, Mimi-nashi Hōichi）, Hōichi is a blind biwa player at Amidaji temple. Ghostly warriors ask him to perform the story of the Battle of Dan-no-ura, with Hōichi not realising that his audience is dead.

A priest covers Hōichi’s body with the text of the Heart Sutra to hide him from the ghosts, but his ears are missed. When the ghost returns, it can see only the ears and tears them away.

Yuki-onna: Snow-Woman Stories

雪女（ゆきおんな, yuki-onna）, the “snow woman”, appears in many regional stories rather than one fixed legend. She is often described as an eerily beautiful woman encountered during heavy snow.

Some versions make her deadly, freezing travellers or stealing their life force. In others she spares someone, marries a human or shows a more ambiguous side. Calling every yuki-onna murderous misses that variety.

Japanese Ghost Stories in Films and Anime

Japanese horror has travelled widely through films such as Ring and Ju-On. These four titles offer more supernatural listening practice, although they are best suited to learners who already understand some conversational Japanese.

Gakkō no Kaidan (Ghost Stories)

学校の怪談（がっこうのかいだん, Gakkō no Kaidan）, “School Ghost Stories”, is a 2000 anime television series based on books by Tōru Tsunemitsu. Satsuki and her friends confront spirits in a haunted school, following clues left by Satsuki’s late mother.

Yamishibai: Japanese Ghost Stories

闇芝居（やみしばい, Yamishibai）, “Theatre of Darkness”, is an anime anthology of short horror stories. Each episode is framed by a masked narrator who uses the visual style of kamishibai, traditional paper theatre.

Dark Water

The 2002 Japanese film 仄暗い水の底から（ほのぐらいみずのそこから, Honogurai Mizu no Soko kara）, released internationally as Dark Water, follows a mother and daughter in a run-down apartment building where an ominous leak is only the start of the trouble.

Pulse

回路（かいろ, Kairo）, “Circuit”, is a 2001 cult horror film released in English as Pulse. Its ghosts spread through the internet as people disappear and Tokyo becomes increasingly empty.

Did These Japanese Ghost Stories Give You Chills?

ぞっとしましたか？（Zotto shimashita ka?） Did that give you chills?

Try choosing five terms from this article and using each one in a short Japanese sentence. The contrast between yūrei, yōkai and oni is a particularly useful place to start.

If you want a clear plan for turning vocabulary into conversation, the Fluent in 3 Months Bootcamp gives you a structured path and support from language coaches.