(zì) - character, written word in Mandarin

zì

Traditional: 字

#1256 of 5,000 Core 5000

Translation

character, written word

Word origin

The character shows a child 子 under a roof 宀, an image of raising offspring. It was extended to mean characters, which were thought of as being born from simpler graphs.

Origin: associative compound
Root: 宀 (roof) + 子 (zǐ, child)

Stroke order

字

Examples

？

How do you read this character?

。

His handwriting is very beautiful.

。

I do not recognise this character.

。

Please write your name here.

千qiān。

Chinese has tens of thousands of characters.

字 (zì) means a character or written word. It is the basic unit of the Chinese writing system.

Where this fits

The 1,000 most common Mandarin words

Where this word sits in the core vocabulary, and what to learn around it.

Mandarin vocabulary by HSK level

How many words each level actually needs, with real counts.

Mandarin learning guides

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Appears in 4 words

Multi-character compounds in the corpus that contain 字.

名字míng zìname (of a person or thing)字幕zì mùsubtitles, captions 字幕组zì mù zǔsubtitling group, fansub team 数字shù zìnumber, numeral, figure, digit

Used in

Stories

(3)

Grammar articles

(15)

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Mandarin · Free printables

字: worksheet, infographic and listicle

Free printable study downloads for the Mandarin word "字" (character, written word): a worksheet with the answer key built in, an infographic, and a sentence listicle. Open any one to view, print or save.

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This word is part of lesson 26.