How to type small tsu っ

You don’t need a special Japanese keyboard to type in Japanese! You can type small tsu on a keyboard after you install Microsoft IME Japanese for a PC, or add Japanese with your Mac. In order to type small tsu you type ‘xtsu’ or ‘ltsu’.

‘l’ or ‘x’ before ‘tsu’ and any other small Character

You can actually type all small characters by proceeding them with ‘l’ or ‘x’. So, 「ぁ、ぃ、ぅ、ぇ、ぉ、ゃ、ゅ、ょ、ヵ、ヶ、ゎ」could be types like “la, li, lu, le, lo, lya, lyu, lyo, lka, lke, lwa” or “xa, xi, xu, xe, xo, xya, xyu, xyo, xka, xke, xwa”.

Type the same Consonant twice

If you want to type 「にっぽん」then you would type ‘N’, ‘I’, ‘P’, ‘P’, ‘O’, ‘N’. Anytime you type small tsu within a word just type the same consonant twice. Another example 「けっこん」”Marriage”, you would type ‘K’, ‘E’, ‘K’, ‘K’, ‘O’, ‘N’. If you want to say 「きった」”cut”, you would type ‘K’, ‘I’, ‘T’, ‘T’, ‘A’. In order to type「こっち」” this way” you would type, ‘K’, ‘O’, ‘C’, ‘C’, ‘H’, ‘I’.

https://japaneseuniverse.com/2024/02/18/pac-man-in-japaneseconcepts-behind-development-to-global-icon/

If you would like to learn more about how to pronounce small tsu I have a whole post in “What does the Small Tsu Sound like?“

So after learning to type in Japanese, If you want to learn more Japanese I reviewed a dictionary of grammar series which I personally recommend and use myself.

I also have several other posts on various topics on Japanese Universe if you are interested. 

Vocabulary

日本 (nippon) – Japan
結婚 (kekkon) – Marriage
切った (kitta) – to cut ( past tense)
こっち (kocchi) – this way

Resources

• Apple Mac
• Microsoft PC