Name in Japanese J Jan

Jan in Japanese

ジャン
Katakana
ジャン
Hiragana
じゃん
Romaji (Hepburn)
Jan

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

How Jan sounds in Japanese

Read it one katakana at a time:

ジャ Ja
N

Full reading: Jan

Do more with Jan in Japanese

Why Jan 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, Jan appears as ジャン. This is the correct and respectful way a non-Japanese name is represented; it is not a kanji "translation". A Japanese reader sees ジャン and immediately reads it by its sound, Jan.

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 Jan becomes ジャン 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.