Kilo Lingo

(yě) - also, too, as well in Mandarin

yě

Traditional: 也

Line drawing of 也
Coloured illustration of 也
HSK 1
#25 of 5,000 Core 1000

Translation

also, too, as well

Word origin

也 (yě) means 'also, too'. The character is generally taken to derive from an ancient pictograph; the depicted object is uncertain (a serpent or a vessel are both proposed), and the modern grammatical sense 'also' is a phonetic loan unrelated to the original picture.

Origin
pictograph (depicted object debated)
Root
也, an ancient pictograph borrowed phonetically for the grammatical sense

Stroke order

Stroke order for 也

也

Examples

，？

I am going - are you going too?

，。

I like this book, and he likes it too.

菜cài，。

This dish is very tasty and also very cheap.

。

I also want to go with you.

，。

She is not hungry, and neither am I.

也 (yě) is the standard additive adverb in Mandarin, equivalent to "also" or "too" in English. Unlike English where "too" typically appears at the end of a sentence, 也 must be placed directly before the verb or adjective it modifies. It cannot appear at the end of a clause.

也 differs from 还 (hái, also/still) in that 也 emphasises addition or similarity (a second entity sharing the same predicate), while 还 more often means "in addition" or "still." In formal and written contexts 也 can take on a concessive meaning ("even if... also..."), as in 再忙也要吃饭 ("No matter how busy, one must still eat").

Appears in 2 words

Multi-character compounds in the corpus that contain 也.

也许yě xǔperhaps, maybe, possibly再也zài yěnever again, not any more

Used in

Stories

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This word is part of lesson 1.