JLPT Giving and Receiving Verbs: あげる, くれる, もらう

One group of expressions that quietly causes trouble for many learners in JLPT grammar and reading is giving and receiving expressions.

「あげる」, 「くれる」, and 「もらう」.

The words themselves are often learned fairly early, but once they appear in test questions, learners suddenly become unsure.

You may know the meanings, but when you see the answer choices, your mind stops for a moment. Has that ever happened to you?

The reason these three are difficult is that simply memorizing “give” and “receive” is not enough.

What really matters is not losing sight of whose viewpoint the sentence is using.

Giving and receiving expressions do not only show the movement of an object or action.

They also show which side the speaker is emotionally placing the focus on.

That is why, if you get the viewpoint wrong, you may choose the wrong answer even if you roughly understand the meaning.

In this article, we will organize the JLPT expressions 「あげる」, 「くれる」, and 「もらう」 using one clear axis: “Whose viewpoint is this?”

First conclusion: Think in terms of “whose viewpoint”

Let’s start with the most important point.

• 「あげる」
  An expression that looks from the giving side

• 「くれる」
  An expression used when something comes toward the speaker’s side, or someone close to the speaker

• 「もらう」
  An expression that looks from the receiving side

If you only memorize these three by translating them into your native language, you will almost certainly become confused at some point.

What matters is the position of the viewpoint:

• Who gave it?
• Toward whom did it come?
• Who received it?

「あげる」 looks from the giving side

「あげる」 is used when A gives something to B, and the sentence is viewed from A’s side.

Example sentences

• 「私は友だちに本をあげました。」
  I gave a book to my friend.

• 「田中さんは妹にお菓子をあげました。」
  Tanaka gave sweets to his younger sister.

What you should notice here is that the person who gives something often becomes the subject.

In other words, the camera is facing the giving side.

A common JLPT mistake

A common mistake is to use 「あげる」 whenever something moves toward another person.

However, when something comes toward the speaker, the correct expression may be 「くれる」 instead of 「あげる」.

In other words, the direction of movement alone is not enough.

You also have to look at the relationship to the speaker.

「くれる」 comes toward the speaker’s side

「くれる」 is used when someone gives something to the speaker, or to someone close to the speaker.

Example sentences

• 「友だちが私に本をくれました。」
  My friend gave me a book.

• 「先生が弟にアドバイスをくれました。」
  The teacher gave my younger brother advice.

The important point here is that the receiver is the speaker, or someone the speaker feels psychologically close to.

Many learners want to say:

「友だちが私に本をあげました。」

But in Japanese, you use 「くれる」 here.

That is because the action is coming toward the speaker’s side.

A common JLPT mistake

「くれる」 is not simply “give.”

It contains the feeling that something comes toward “our side” or “my side.”

If you process it only through translation, you may easily become confused in sentences such as:

• 「私にくれた」
  gave it to me

• 「母にくれた」
  gave it to my mother

• 「弟にくれた」
  gave it to my younger brother

Especially in reading and grammar questions, if you cannot identify who is close to the speaker, the answer choices quickly become unclear.

「もらう」 looks from the receiving side

「もらう」 is used when the receiver is the subject.

Example sentences

• 「私は友だちに本をもらいました。」
  I received a book from my friend.

• 「妹は先生に花をもらいました。」
  My younger sister received flowers from the teacher.

In this expression, the viewpoint is on the person who received something.

So even if the event itself is the same, the camera position is different from 「あげる」 and 「くれる」.

Compare these sentences

• 「私は友だちに本をあげました。」
  I gave a book to my friend.

• 「友だちが私に本をくれました。」
  My friend gave me a book.

• 「私は友だちに本をもらいました。」
  I received a book from my friend.

The people and the book may be the same, but the verb changes depending on where the viewpoint is.

Once you can organize this, giving and receiving expressions become much easier to understand.

Thinking with arrows makes it easier

If giving and receiving expressions confuse you, try drawing arrows in your mind.

「あげる」

A → B

Look from A’s side.

「くれる」

A → me / my side

Something comes toward my side.

「もらう」

A → B

Look from B’s side.

In other words, you should think about both the direction of the arrow and where the camera is.

If you memorize these two things together, you will be less likely to waver when choosing an answer.

Action-based giving and receiving is even more confusing

On the JLPT, giving and receiving expressions often appear not only with objects, but also with actions.

• 「教えてあげる」
  to teach someone for their benefit

• 「教えてくれる」
  someone teaches me or someone on my side

• 「教えてもらう」
  to receive someone’s teaching

When the expression is used with an action, it becomes even harder to see who did something for whom.

But the way of thinking is the same.

Example sentences

• 「私は友だちに日本語を教えてあげました。」
  I taught Japanese to my friend.

• 「友だちが私に日本語を教えてくれました。」
  My friend taught me Japanese.

• 「私は友だちに日本語を教えてもらいました。」
  I had my friend teach me Japanese.

Here again, the choice depends on viewpoint.

• 「あげる」 focuses on the side that does the action for someone
• 「くれる」 means someone does something for my side
• 「もらう」 means I receive the action from someone

JLPT questions often target subject changes

In giving and receiving expression questions, the JLPT often changes the subject or standpoint slightly.

Because the meanings look similar, all the choices may seem correct when you are in a hurry.

But in reality, some choices have the wrong viewpoint.

For example:

• 「私は先生に本をくれました。」
  This is unnatural because 「私」 is the subject, but 「くれる」 means something comes toward the speaker’s side.

• 「先生は私に本をあげました。」
  This sounds unnatural in ordinary Japanese when the speaker is the receiver.

• 「私は先生に本をもらいました。」
  I received a book from the teacher.

• 「先生は私に本をくれました。」
  The teacher gave me a book.

When choices like these are lined up, learners who only follow word order easily become confused.

What you need here is not only vocabulary knowledge, but a fixed viewpoint.

Ask yourself:

• Who is the subject?
• Which way does the arrow point?
• Is the action coming toward the speaker’s side?

Just checking these three points will make many questions look much clearer.

When “someone close to the speaker” appears, the difficulty increases

One thing that makes giving and receiving expressions even more difficult is when the receiver is not 「私」, but someone close to the speaker.

For example, when a family member or someone close appears, 「くれる」 may be used.

Example sentence

• 「先生が弟に本をくれました。」
  The teacher gave my younger brother a book.

This sentence is natural because the younger brother is viewed as someone close to the speaker.

If you simply think, “It is not me, so 「くれる」 cannot be used,” you may misunderstand the sentence.

In other words, the receiver of 「くれる」 is not always the speaker.

If the speaker sees that person as being on the inside, 「くれる」 can work.

This sense is very important not only in short grammar questions, but also in reading passages and dialogues.

When in doubt, ask “Whose side is this sentence happy for?”

When you are confused by giving and receiving expressions, it helps to ask:

“Whose side is this sentence standing on?”

• If you want to describe the action from the giving side
  → 「あげる」

• If there is a feeling that someone did something for my side
  → 「くれる」

• If you want to describe it from the receiving side
  → 「もらう」

For some learners, thinking in terms of “the happy direction” makes the idea suddenly clear.

This is especially useful for 「くれる」, because it is not only about direction. It also contains the feeling that someone did something for “us” or “me.”

At N3 and N2, viewpoint is stronger than meaning

In N3 and N2 grammar, many expressions have similar meanings.

Giving and receiving expressions are tricky because, if you look only at meaning, they all seem to be about “giving” and “receiving.”

That is why these methods eventually reach their limit:

• memorizing only translations
• memorizing only words
• choosing by feeling

What makes you strong in the actual test is the ability to mechanically check:

“Whose viewpoint is this sentence using?”

Once you can fix the viewpoint, giving and receiving expressions can actually become a reliable scoring area.

For a broader view of cause and reason expressions, see the guide to confusing JLPT reason expressions. Confusing JLPT Reason and Cause Expressions

For a broader view of limitation expressions, see the guide to confusing JLPT limitation expressions. Confusing JLPT Limitation Expressions

Summary: If you do not lose the viewpoint, giving and receiving expressions are not scary

People who struggle with 「あげる」, 「くれる」, and 「もらう」 usually do not lack knowledge of their meanings.

In many cases, the problem is simply that the viewpoint is still unclear.

When you see a giving and receiving expression, the first thing to think about is this:

“From whose standpoint is this sentence being viewed?”

Once that is clear, the verb you should choose becomes much easier to see.

On the other hand, if you leave this point vague, you will keep getting stuck in the same place no matter how many questions you solve.

With RJT, you can study confusing grammar points like these not only by meaning, but also by viewpoint and usage.

Instead of simply answering one question and moving on, you can learn to see why that answer is correct. When that happens, your grammar becomes much more stable.

Giving and receiving expressions are not mainly about memorization. They are about organization.

“Whose viewpoint is it?”

First, build this one clear axis firmly in your mind.