狭い
せまい
hepburn semai
narrow, cramped
Part of speech · i-adjective
Pattern visualization
no decomposition available
Examples
- この部屋は狭いです。This room is narrow.
- 日本のアパートは狭いです。Japanese apartments are small/narrow.
Collocations
狭い部屋 (narrow room)狭い道 (narrow road)視野が狭い (narrow-minded)心が狭い (mean-spirited)狭くなる (become narrow)
Mnemonic
狭い semai — opposite of 広い. Tokyo apartment vocab cliché — Japanese urban housing is famously small. 心が狭い idiom = "narrow-hearted/petty". 視野が狭い = narrow-minded. The kanji 狭 rarely takes onyomi in everyday use — primarily as i-adjective.
Quick check
"Petty / narrow-minded"?