Table of Contents

Giving and Receiving

あげる

Give to X (person socially higher)
Ｘにあげる

あげる means to give (to someone higher (socially)). This pattern is pretty straightforward.

に is used to identify to who/what you gave something.
を is used to mark what is being given.

彼にピザをあげる – Give him pizza.
彼女にはなたばをあげた – I gave her a bundle of flowers.
猫を彼女にあげた – I gave a cat to her.

やる

やる is the kind of give you’d use for giving food to pets. Its kind of rude, but is still used in certain regions (and isn’t rude there).

When something is given to you, くれる or もらう (see below) is preferred.

くれる

くれる is a word that means “give down (Socially)”. It is usually used to describe what other people did for you, and has the added nuance of “for me”. When used in this way, it can sound more grateful than just using もらう。
Grammatically, it functions just like あげる. Generally the receiver here is 私 and is omitted.

彼がプレゼントをくれました -He gave me a present.
彼女が私に花をくれました – She gave me flowers

もらう

To get from X
Xにもらう

もらう is a word that means “to get/receive”.

に is used to mark the person from who you recieved.
を is used to mark the thing received.

Examples

かれにゆびわをもらった – I got a ring from him.
彼女に手紙をもらった – I received a letter from her.

You may replace に here with から。

先生から宿題をもらった – Received homework from the teacher.
彼女から手紙をもらった – Received a letter from her.

See also て + giving/receiving verbs
Also see いただく

もらえないか

もらう is much more commonly used than あげる, and is often used to request something from another person. A slightly more polite way to ask for something, is to ask if you can receive it. To do this, you must use the the potential (“can”) form of もらう, which is もらえる.

リンゴをもらえませんか – Can I get an apple?
えんぴつをもらえませんか – Can I get a pencil?

A note about に

The に used here causes a lot of confusion with early Japanese learners.

This is the “Two Party Verb” に. This is the に used with verbs like はなす、あう、つたえる、etc. It marks the other party necessary for an action to occur.
The one giving/receiving will be the topic, but the other party must exist to enable the action.

に marks the party that enables the action of giving or recieving to occur. .

彼にもらった – I got from him. — “I” am doing the getting. – Someone must give for you to receive.
彼女にあげた – I gave to her — “I” am the one doing the giving. – Someone must receive for you to give.

This に is going to be become even more important later on, so please remember it.