How do you say "butcher" in Japanese?

In Japanese, "butcher" is 肉屋 (nikuya). It is a noun pronounced "nee-koo-yah".

Listen to the pronunciation:

Illustration of butcher from Noun Town

Pronunciation

肉屋 is written in kanji. Romanised as nikuya, it sounds roughly like "nee-koo-yah" to an English ear.

Example sentence

兄は肉屋になりたいと言っています。

Ani wa nikuya ni naritai to itte imasu.

My older brother says he wants to become a butcher.

Usage notes

Nikuya (肉屋) is the Japanese word for butcher. Job titles in Japanese use a variety of endings: shi (士) for licensed professionals, sha (者) for workers, while modern roles often use katakana loanwords.

Related words

Curated by Jack Ratcliffe

Practice 肉屋 and hundreds more Japanese words in the game.

Buy on Steam

Questions about 肉屋

How do you pronounce 肉屋?

肉屋 is romanised as nikuya. Say it roughly like "nee-koo-yah" in English. Each Japanese syllable has even weight, so keep the rhythm steady.

Is 肉屋 formal or casual?

肉屋 is a neutral, everyday word that works in both casual and polite speech. The level of formality comes from the sentence structure around it, not from the word itself.

How is 肉屋 written in Japanese?

肉屋 is written using kanji. Kanji characters carry the core meaning; any hiragana or katakana that follow show grammatical endings.

This word is part of the vocabulary taught in the Japanese language learning game Noun Town, where words are introduced through play rather than memorisation.