WHAT IS DIFFERENT BETWEEN “らしい”, “みたい”, and “っぽい”

“らしい”, “みたい”, and “っぽい” mean “like” or “similar” but are all slightly different. Today, TODAI Japanese will show you some slight differences.

 

🟣 らしい - Expressing hearsay or behavior using

 

◼ 「らしい」 can be directly attached to nouns, adjectives, or verbs to show that things appear to be a certain way due to what you've heard. 

 

📌 Eg:

 

（Ａ）　今日、田中さんはこないの？- Is Tanaka-san not coming today?

 

（Ｂ）　こないらしい。- Seems like it (based on what I heard).

 

（Ａ）　あの人は何なの？- What is that person over there?

 

（Ｂ）　美由紀さんの友達らしいですよ。- Seems to be Miyuki-san's friend (based on what I heard).

 

◼「らしい」to indicate that a person seems to be a certain thing due to his behavior.

 

📌 Eg:

 

（１）　あの子は子供らしくない。- That child does not act like a child.

 

（２）　大人らしくするつもりだったのに、大騒ぎしてしまった。- Despite the fact that I planned to act like an adult, I ended up making a big ruckus.

 

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🟣 みたい - something looks like something else

 

◼ N みたい

 

Attach 「みたい」 to the noun that bears the resemblance. 「みたい」 conjugates like a noun or na-adjective and not an i-adjective. So このピザはお好み焼きみたいじゃない？- Doesn't this pizza looks like okonomiyaki? (NOT お好み焼きみたくない？)

 

📌 Eg:

 

制服を着ている姿をみると、学生みたいです。- Looking at the uniform-wearing figure, (person) looks like a student. (The implied meaning here is the person wearing the uniform is not really a student because he/she only looks like a student.)

 

Non-Past - 犬みたい = looks like a dog

 

Past - 犬だったみたい = didn't look like a dog

 

Negative - 犬じゃないみたい = doesn't look like a dog

 

Negative Past - 犬じゃなかったみたい = didn't look like a dog

 

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🟣 っぽい - like a

 

A really casual way to express similarity is to attach 「っぽい」 to the word that reflects the resemblance.

 

Noun + っぽい

 

Verb-stem + っぽい

 

いadj (-い) + っぽい

 

なadj + っぽい

 

「 っぽい」 conjugates just like an i-adjective, as seen by example （３） below.

 

📌 Eg:

 

（１）　あの人はちょっと韓国人っぽいよね。- That person looks like a Korean person, huh?

 

（２）　みんなで、もう全部食べてしまったっぽいよ。- It appears that everybody ate everything already.

 

（３）　恭子は全然女っぽくないね。- Kyouko is not womanly at all, huh?

 

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