What's the difference between "巻寿司" (makizushi), "海苔巻き" (norimaki), and "巻物" (makimono)? It seems there are three words for the same Japanese food item, a kind of "sushi in a long roll": * "" (makizushi) * "" (norimaki) * "" (makimono) Are they all identical / synonyms? Do they refer to subtly different things? Are they used in different regions? Are they used by different generations of Japanese? [Sidenote: At the risk of side-tracking another food question, there only seems to be one word for these in Korean: "" (gimbap).]

The literal meanings of these words are:

* (): sushi roll
* (): something rolled with nori, a specific kind of seaweed
* (): something rolled



usually refers to sushi roll with nori, but depending on the context, it can refer to other kinds of food, including () and ().

Unlike , I do not think that is understood as sushi roll unless it is clear from the context that one is talking about sushi. As crunchyt wrote, can also mean a scroll.

When used to describe kinds of sushi, these three words are almost synonymous, but sushi rolled with something other than nori (usually egg) can be called or but not .