Name in Japanese J Jeffery

Jeffery in Japanese

ジェフリー
Katakana
ジェフリー
Hiragana
じぇふりー
Romaji (Hepburn)
Jefurī

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

How Jeffery sounds in Japanese

Read it one katakana at a time:

ジェ Je
Fu
リー

Full reading: Jefurī

Do more with Jeffery in Japanese

Why Jeffery 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, Jeffery appears as ジェフリー. This is the correct and respectful way a non-Japanese name is represented; it is not a kanji "translation". A Japanese reader sees ジェフリー and immediately reads it by its sound, Jefurī.

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 Jeffery becomes ジェフリー 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.