bo / ぼ
The last of the B row — ほ with two tiny ticks (゛) becomes 'bo'. Anchors hats and the casual masculine pronoun 僕 (boku, 'I').
Pronunciation
The character ぼ represents the syllable 'bo', a soft 'b' followed by 'o'. It is ほ with the dakuten that voices 'h' to 'b'.
ぼ is ほ (ho) plus the dakuten ゛. It anchors 帽子 (boushi, "hat"), 僕 (boku, the casual male first-person pronoun "I"), 棒 (bou, "stick / pole"), 防止 (boushi, "prevention"), 祖母 (sobo, "one's own grandmother"). Word-initial ぼ is /bo/. The same ほ base with handakuten ゜ becomes ぽ (po) — the last character in the chart.
How to write ぼ
Trace ぼ on the canvas at the top of the page. Animated arrows show each stroke's direction; trace along them and the stroke fills in. Each numbered step below explains what that stroke does.
Write ほ exactly: stroke 1 a short vertical on the left, slanting slightly; stroke 2 a long horizontal-with-tail near the top right that crosses through; stroke 3 a second horizontal just below stroke 2, parallel and slightly shorter; stroke 4 a long flowing curving stroke that begins below the horizontals, drops down through the centre, and loops around at the bottom right.
Add the dakuten (゛): two small tick marks at the upper right of the character. Strokes 5 and 6 are the two ticks.
Origin
Hiragana ぼ shares its base shape with ほ, which evolved from the kanji 保 (ho, "to protect / preserve"). The kanji's strokes compressed into the four strokes of ほ — note the visual similarity to は, with an extra horizontal. The dakuten ゛ voiced /ho/ into /bo/; the handakuten ゜ produces ぽ (po).
Common words starting with ぼ
Printable practice sheet
Print this worksheet to practice writing ぼ by hand — the top row shows the stroke order to trace, then fill the blank squares.
Lock it into memory
Reading is only half of it. Drill the hiragana you’ve learned with spaced-repetition flashcards — the fastest way to make them stick.