Name in Japanese B Boris

Boris in Japanese

ボリス
Katakana
ボリス
Hiragana
ぼりす
Romaji (Hepburn)
Borisu

This is the established spelling used for Boris in Japanese dictionaries, books and media.

How Boris sounds in Japanese

Read it one katakana at a time:

Bo
Ri
Su

Full reading: Borisu

Do more with Boris in Japanese

Why Boris is written in katakana

In Japanese, foreign names are written in katakana — the angular script reserved for words borrowed from other languages. So on a form, a name tag, a delivery slip or a news article in Japan, Boris appears as ボリス. This is the correct and respectful way a non-Japanese name is represented; it is not a kanji "translation". A Japanese reader sees ボリス and immediately reads it by its sound, Borisu.

Katakana is a syllabary, so English sounds are fitted to the nearest Japanese syllables and every consonant (except ん) is followed by a vowel. That is why Boris becomes ボリス rather than a letter-for-letter copy. More than one katakana spelling can be reasonable for the same name, which is why we flag whether a spelling is a long-established one or a natural default.