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.

lún

This 4-stroke character looks simple — but it’s

móu

This elegant 8-stroke character looks like a perso

yòu

Born from ancient wine rituals, 侑 looks like a pe

This 'still' isn’t about waiting — it’s the sac

zhū

This ‘dwarf’ character secretly rules the age of

shì

Though it means 'to serve,' 侍 isn’t about chores

kuǎ

A person (亻) plus 'boast' (夸) — born from Ming-

This 'character' has zero strokes, zero historical

gāi

侅 is a linguistic mirage: a character that looks

tuō

This rare character looks like a person beside a c

shēn

This 'crowd' character isn’t drawn from bodies—i

xíng

This 'shape' character doesn’t depict contours —

This 8-stroke character encodes ancient China’s e

This rare, elegant character hides a warrior’s gr

jiǎo

Looks like 'person + cross legs', but it’s not ab

tiāo

This 8-stroke character began as a wobbly kneeling

quán

This rare ‘immortal’ character hides a Daoist se

guǐ

A person (亻) holding ritual jade (圭) upside-down

huó

This 'meet' character is so rare in modern speech

hěn

This 'hěn' looks like 'very' but means 'defy heav

This 'stiff-person + auspicious' character flipped

èr

This rare 'assistant' character hides a ceremonial

bǎi

This ‘hundred’ doesn’t count people — it guard

yáng

This 'feign' character hides a sheep in plain sigh

lǎo

This 'male-guy' suffix looks like 'old person' but

huái

This rare character looks like a person trapped in

A 20th-century invented character—no ancient root

This six-stroke character was invented in the 1950