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PlainSpell

kigurumi

ki·gu·ru·mi/kɪ.ɡuˈɹu.mi/noun

kigurumi is a noun meaning “A full-body costume of a cartoon character (typically a mascot of cartoonish proportions) originating in Japan” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled K-I-G-U-R-U-M-I and has 4 syllables (ki·gu·ru·mi), and it appears about once in every 63 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of kigurumi is kigurumis.

What does kigurumi mean?

noun

  1. 1

    A full-body costume of a cartoon character (typically a mascot of cartoonish proportions) originating in Japan.

  2. 2

    A full-body cosplay of a human cartoon character with realistic proportions paired with an anime-style mask, originating in Japan; also (metonymic), the anime-style mask used in such a cosplay.

  3. 3

    A themed onesie, typically in the style of a cartoon animal.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce kigurumi?

  • UK /kɪ.ɡuːˈɹuː.mi/
  • US /kɪ.ɡuˈɹu.mi/
  • US /ˌkiː-/

Kigurumi has 4 syllables, split ki·gu·ru·mi in writing.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-kigurumi.wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Naomi_Persephone_Amethyst_(NaomiAmethyst)-kigurumi.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of kigurumi

  • kigurumis plural

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is kigurumi?

Kigurumi appears about once in every 63 million words in written English, the 249,463rd most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Kigurumi in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

In the sense full-body costume and mask:

LanguageWords
Portuguesekigurumi

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does kigurumi come from?

Borrowed from Japanese 着ぐるみ (kigurumi), from 着 (ki, “clothes, outfit”) + 包み (kurumi, “bundle, parcel”) (referring to the fact that the costume completely encloses the wearer).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).