What's the difference between 見える and 見れる?

Question

Answer

見える - 1: to be seen; to be in sight;  2: to look; to seem; to appear;

見れる - to be able to see

机の上に花が見える。 - I see a flower on the desk.
猫は暗がり目が見える。- Cats can see in the dark.

あの山の上に海が見える:
From the top of that mountain, the ocean can be seen.

You can see that both 見える and 見れる have much in common. They have one root: 見る (miru, to see) → 見られる (mirareru, to be able to see)

Answer

こんばんは、chrisvさん。

As Syaoran 小狼 pointed out, both "見える" and "見(ら)れる" may be used as "to be able to see". I guess this is what you want to ask about in this question, but nobody has explained it so far.

When translated as "to be able to see", "見える" and "見(ら)れる" are different in that the former implies that (A) you are able to see even if you neither make any special efforts nor do you want to see, while the latter (B) you have to do something, or you need special condition to be able to see/watch.

Strictly speaking, "見れる" has to be "見られる", which is what we call "ら抜き言葉 (dropping the ra)". Even native Japanese use the former incorrectly, but you don't have to be so nervous about it in the case above or outside of exams.

Note that there are cases where you can't use "見れる" instead of "見られる".

"見られる" also means (C) "can be taken/recognized/observed" and (D) "worth watching". Both also might be just translated as "be able to see", but you have to know these meanings to use it correctly.

Here are some examples.
# [O] stands for "OK", and [X] "NG".

(A) We can see other people's faults well.
[O] 他人の欠点はよく見えます。
[X] 他人の欠点はよく見れます。
[X] 他人の欠点はよく見られます。
# We can see without special effort.

(B) You can watch TV if you pay the fee.
[X] お金を払えば、テレビが見える。
[O] お金を払えば、テレビが見れる。
[O] お金を払えば、テレビが見られる。
# You need to pay to watch.

(A & B) You can see outside better from the upstairs.
[O] 二階の方が景色がよく見える。
[O] 二階の方が景色がよく見れる。
[O] 二階の方が景色がよく見られる。
# "You can see better from the upstairs" & "you need to go upstairs to see better"

(C) This is the tendency that can be recognized/observed with the younger generation.
[X] これは若者に見える傾向ですね。
[X] これは若者に見れる傾向ですね。
[O] これは若者に見られる傾向ですね。

(D) Lately, there's no TV program worth watching.
[X] 最近は見える番組がない。
[X] 最近は見れる番組がない。
[O] 最近は見られる番組がない。

HTH

Answer

actually, both may be used as "to be able to see" as well