晩 means “evening, night”

ばん · ban

Also: nightfall

On'yomi (Chinese reading)

バン

JLPT N3 · Taught in grade 6 · 12 strokes

The story

The sun (日) let off (免) its duty for the day: evening. 晩ご飯 is dinner, 一晩 a whole night, and the greeting こんばんは is really 今晩は, "as for this evening."

Used in 今晩 (konban, tonight), 晩ご飯 (bangohan, dinner), and 毎晩 (maiban, every night)

More from Time & Change

• 化 transform
• 成 become
• 期 period
• 続 continue
• 初 first
• 際 edge
• 次 next
• 昨 yesterday
• 変 change
• 過 pass
• 末 end
• 未 not yet

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Readings from KANJIDIC2, © EDRDG, CC BY-SA.