Verb Groups
The two groups of verbs are:
- consonant-stem, godan katsuyō (五段活用?), Group I, or u verbs, and
- vowel-stem, ichidan katsuyō (一段活用?), Group II, or ru verbs.
Most verbs are consonant-stem, but vowel-stem verbs are also common, hence the numbering "Group I" (consonant-stem, more common) and "Group II" (vowel-stem, less common). Sometimes categorization is expanded to include "Group III" (special cases) for the irregular verbs する suru and 来る kuru; note however that there are other Japanese irregular verbs, though they are generally only slightly irregular.
Consonant-stem verbs end in -u (-au, -iu, -ou), -ku, -gu, -su, -tsu, -nu, -bu, -mu or -ru, but not -uu, -eu, -zu, -dzu, -hu, -pu, or the defective columns -yu or -wu.
All vowel-stem verbs end in either -iru or -eru. However, not all verbs ending in iru or eru are vowel-stem verbs; for example, hashiru, "run", is a consonant-stem verb. Verbs ending in -aru, -uru and -oru also exist, and are all consonant-stem.
Read more about this topic: Japanese Consonant And Vowel Verbs
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