In this paper , we used the composition data of the learner’s inter-language corpus of Hunan University, and made an investigation on the usage and acquisition of the potential expression by the Japanese-learners. The results showed that, with the increase in the year of Japanese learning, the use of potential expression was likely to be more frequent, and the rate also generally showed an increasing trend. compared with the 'potential verb' and the 'auxiliary verb rareru' , '- dekiru' and '-kotogadekiru' were easy to be acquired by the learners. In addition, from the distribution of the various forms of misuse , the misuse case about 'error on forms' was far more than three other misuse types.