安い

What it means

安い (yasui) means cheap or inexpensive; it denotes that something costs relatively little and conveys affordability as its primary sense while context can add neutral or negative shades about value or quality.

Main meanings

• When used disparagingly, points to low quality, poor craftsmanship, or lack of prestige rather than price alone.
• Homophonous use as an adjectival suffix meaning “easy to [verb]” (often written 易い (yasui)); in speech the pronunciation overlaps and this use denotes low difficulty.
• Can imply comparative affordability — highlighting a cost advantage versus alternatives rather than an absolute price tag.

How to use it

Common in everyday speech and writing to talk about cost and value; it appears before nouns when modifying (prenominal) and after nouns as a predicate, conjugates like other Japanese i-adjectives (negative, past, polite forms), and in polite or commercial contexts speakers often choose softer alternatives to avoid sounding blunt.