ho / ホ
The last of the H row — “ho” in four strokes, shaped like the kanji 木. Opens hotel, home, and hot.
Pronunciation
The character ホ represents the syllable 'ho', identical in pronunciation to hiragana ほ. Common in loanwords for hotel, hot, home, white, horror, and many compound words.
ホ matches hiragana ほ — a steady “ho.” With four strokes it's the busiest kana in the row, shaped much like the kanji 木 (tree). It opens loanwords like ホテル (hotel), ホーム (home), ホット (hot), ホワイト (white).
How to write ホ
Trace ホ 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.
A horizontal stroke across the upper third, left to right.
A long vertical crossing it, descending from the top to the bottom.
A short diagonal flicking down to the lower left.
A short diagonal flicking down to the lower right — the two legs that make ホ resemble the kanji 木 (tree).
Origin
Katakana ホ comes from the kanji 保 (ho, “to protect” or “keep”). Its lower-right 木-like element became ホ, which is why the kana looks so much like 木 (tree).
Common words starting with ホ
Printable practice sheet
Print this worksheet to practice writing ホ by hand — the top row shows the stroke order to trace, then fill the blank squares.
Lock it into memory
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