Browse Characters — Learn Chinese Through Stories

Every character has an origin. Discover the pictographs, myths, and history behind each Chinese character — with pinyin, stroke order, HSK level, and audio pronunciation.

xiē

This character’s right side 契 originally meant '

shé

This 12-stroke character encodes an exact 2,500-ye

chòng

This character doesn’t exist—it’s a linguistic

jiū

This 'gathering' character hides a secret: its 'au

jiū

Its right side looks like 'autumn' — but 揪 isn’

kāi

This 'wipe' character hides a phonetic disguise: i

This rare character looks like a hand forcing out

chuāi

This 12-stroke character looks like a hand tucking

This character looks like a hand yanking a plant

ǎn

This 'apply' character isn’t about spreading—it

zuàn

A deliberately invented character — not ancient,

yǎn

This character is the ancient, heavy-duty version

shǔn

This rare, elegant character—pronounced shǔn—de

This 12-stroke bow is a frozen moment of Confucian

zhèn

This rare, literary 'stab' character hides Qin dyn

shì

This 'character' has zero strokes, zero historical

xuān

This 12-stroke character visually mimics a hand gr

sāi

This 'shake' character isn’t ancient — it’s a M

kuí

This character began as a bronze-age plumb line—a

yán

A scholarly ghost of 研 — identical in sound and

This 'drawing out' character hides a boat in its r

jiān

This 'shear' character isn’t just old—it’s a li

yuàn

This 'clerk' character hides a rope-pulling hand:

kèn

This rare, literary character looks like 'hand + n

qián

This character began as a bamboo-pole pictograph o

tiàn

This 11-stroke character looks like a hand tiptoei

This 11-stroke character hides a secret: its '米'

zōu

This character looks like a hand grabbing 'take'