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スッキリ sukkiri
Clear — the room and you, at once.
What does sukkiri mean?
Tidy, unclogged, resolved, refreshed. A cleaned desk, a good night's sleep, a haircut and an argument finally settled all produce the same word.
Example
部屋を片付けたらスッキリした。
I tidied the room and everything felt clear.
Vibe
Who you can say this to, and how it lands.
Safe to use Fine in ordinary conversation.
The story behind sukkiri
The interesting part is that Japanese sees no gap between the outside and the inside here. A desk with nothing on it is スッキリ. A design with nothing extra is スッキリ. So is your head after sleeping properly, your throat after medicine works, and your chest after saying the thing you had been sitting on for a week.
It is the natural opposite of モヤモヤ, the fog that will not lift, and the two are used as a pair so often that the negative form does real work: スッキリしない means the matter is technically closed and still bothering you. Tidying is popular here partly because the language treats a cleared room and a cleared mind as the same event.
Get sukkiri in your pocket
スッキリ is one of 308 words in YABAI, a Japanese culture snack for Android. Every word comes with its meaning, an example sentence, a vibe check and a story like the one above — in 13 languages, read aloud by your device. Paid app: no ads, no sign-up, no subscription.
